The Software Engineer

I recently celebrated my birthday and it brought back the memories of the day when I received this special call.

I was sitting in the balcony enjoying the tranquility of a cold winter morning. My hair was still wet. I was sipping a steaming hot cup of coffee when my phone began ringing. It was flashing an anonymous number. I took the call and the voice on the other side showered me with beautiful birthday wishes. I quirked my head sideways and ran my fingers through my wet entangled hair. Still wondering about the anonymous caller, I politely inquired "Many thanks for the wishes but I am unable to recall you. Please help." He glibly replied that he sent a message on my matrimonial account and I accepted his proposal. I realized that Lily must have responded to his message. Quickly recovering, I blamed on my memory and asked for his name etc.

Spent the day with friends and family, watching movie, eating, shopping, dancing etc. I received his call again at 10ish and this time I talked at length. Turned out that he is working in the IT company right opposite to mine and his father is in the same office as my father's. What a coincidence!!! If he is ‘The One’ then world has really shrunk down a small village.

We spoke with each other for a couple of more days, don’t ask me what cuz I myself don’t remember. Let me quickly take you forward to the third day when he called at around 10 to wish 'Good Night'. I have a strong urge to give an exact transcript of the conversation so here we go: 

He: Hey, what’s up?

Me: Nothing much, just had dinner. You say.

He: Just returned from a friend's place, thought of wishing you good night.

Me: Well, thanks and same to you.

He: Is that all? You have nothing else to say.

Me: Oh yeah, have sweet dreams.

He: And...

Me: Sleep well.

He: And...

Me: What and???

He: You think about it. What else you should say??

Me: (Contorting my face in the most impossible manner) I think I have pretty much said what I wanted to. Why don’t you tell me what you expecting to hear? I might say that as well (and let’s get over with it.)

He: No I want you to come up with it.

Me: (Now, you pissing me off) Really sorry, I am very bad at that. Please help.

He: You don’t wanna say that you love me??

Me: (WTF!$%^#@) Well, I haven’t seen you. I don’t know much about you other than what you already told me. I haven’t met with your family. Moreover, my family doesn’t even know about your existence. To me 'love you' means a commitment and it takes time to commit to someone, just a couple of lovy duvy calls are not enough. Clearly, I don’t love you.

He: I don’t wanna marry a girl who doesn’t love me.

Me: Fair enough. Good luck.

World is indeed full of idiosyncrasies. I had a good laugh at myself and immediately shared this incident with Lily. In the process, I abused her for this weird suggestion of having such a matrimonial account.

Up Next: Encounter with The B-School Alum--Keep Watching :)

The IIT Alum

Kids, after the queer encounter with the 'ex-army officer', I was pretty much disappointed and started to lose the whatsoever faith in the matrimonial site. I had shared the admin rights of my account on the web site with my friend too. For ease of reference, let’s name my friend "Lily". So she went back to my account and checked for any potential proposal(s) and voila. A proposal from an IIT alum was waiting for my attention. Not bad at all. Again the same process of sharing details, chatting and talking on phone. Everything deemed perfect by far. He disclosed that he will be traveling to Paris shortly and that he would like to meet me before his departure.

We scheduled a meeting on a comfortable weekend. He flew down to my city. It helped that his real sister was putting up in Delhi. The one-hour meeting unveiled that he possessed average height, athletic physique and was pretty contented with his life. Before leaving, he proposed me. Either he was stampeding or really succumbed to my charms. Nonetheless, it felt great. Isn’t it kinda weird to propose a girl on the very first date, you ask. But I believe it’s okay if the date is matrimonial. I bargained for some time.

He left for Paris and called me every time he called his mother. He would share his experiences and that how much missed his country, his people and sometimes me. HE mentioned that Paris is indeed the most romantic place and he will come back here with his loving wifey (indirectly referring to me). It was flattering but a bit immature too. More on that later.

A fortnight down the line, we met again when came back from his expedition and was on his way to his native place i.e. to see his parents. It was a b'ful morning of the Spring of 2006. I told him that I want him to take a step ahead and meet my family. The words brought a wide smile on his face which I had never witnessed before. Elated, he proposed to speak with his parents and arrange for a meeting between the two families. I was convinced that all along his way back home, he was seething with songs like “Pehli nazar mein kaisa jadoo kar diya".

Guess...stars had something else in store for me. Unfortunately, the same day, in the evening, my grandmother demised of cardiac failure. My family was grief-stricken. I informed him of the loss the next day when he called. Clearly, any progress was inconceivable for at least a fortnight.

Turned out while I was trying to recover and was busy taking care of my family, he was busy meeting with other potential candidates. And a week later, he intimated that he got engaged with a girl picked by his family. I was speechless.

Patience and understanding are the utmost required ingredients in the recipe of a relationship.

The Ex-Army Officer

It was back in the year 2006. I was 23, single and happy. Most of my friends were either engaged or married. A close friend advised me to resort to the matrimonial sites to find my soul-mate. To be honest, I don't believe in the concept of meeting soul-mate via a Web site; you will know eventually, why. As a matter of fact, the secondary purpose of this blog is to warn people about the risks associated with such sites. If you, however, found your soul-mate via such a site and you're happily married as yet, consider yourself lucky.

So, after two-days, my profile with a beautiful picture was flashing on the home page of a famous matrimonial site. In a couple of days, proposals from potential candidates (decent, or so I assumed, and educated) started flowing in.

The first one was an ex-army officer, working with one of the biggest steel plants of the country. I requested for a detailed biodata along with a couple of photographs. What I forgot to mention was recent photographs. In a day's time, photographs of a handsome young man in army uniform were parked in my Inbox. He met the basic criteria of 'educated-working-handsome young man'. Since the base was all set, I decided to take a step ahead, and we started conversing. After a month of chatting and talking, I discovered that he was a male chauvinist and quite regressive in his ideas. I assumed that he was so because he stayed away from civilization for a while. I wanted to give it a chance so called for a vis-à-vis conversation on the nearing Friday.

On the day, I saw him from a distance. To my dismay, it turned out that he looked way too older than the photographs, around 35, with a paunch belly. I had a strong urge to leave without meeting him. I immediately called up my friend and asked her to phone me in exact 10 minutes so that I could leave early. I asked him the reason for difference in the photographs and the real he. He shamelessly blurted out that the photographs were about 6-7 years old. WTF%$^%&%$. We were sitting in Pizza Hut but he wasnt feeling comfortable so he suggested if we could go to some park nearby. Disgusting is what I grumbled out of reflex. If you are from a metro city, you will know that usually lovebirds sit in a park under a tree for embarrassing PDAs. I was stumped, totally. In 10 minutes, I received the premeditated call. I pretended urgency and left hurriedly without any intentions of connecting with him again.

After resting for two-days, I was still not over the weird incident and deigned to go back to the site. But something better was waiting for me. Watch out for the next story.