Today I looked in my wardrobe and decided to wear unattractive, monstrously warm, oversized sweater. For reasons unknown, one of my professors decided to open the window and the entire lecture theatre became freezing. I watched everyone around me put on scarves, jumpers and then coats while feeling smug smug smug.
And that’s why it pays to have no sense of fashion.
I made this ages ago but since people have started to talk about Valentine’s Day it reminded me I wanted to post it!
I’ve been thinking about it, lately.
I’m pretty into the idea of marriage. Once, in one of those upscale novelty candy stores, I saw this really old couple shuffling through. They wore oversized cardigans and looked bewildered by all the bright colours and noise, as if they’d been cryogenically frozen and now woken up in the future.
the huge, ridiculous jelly bean bull we have in Birmingham’s Selfridges store probably looked like a neo-pagan god
The husband picked up one of those novelty candy fans and shoved it in his wife’s face. She shoved back, hit him on the arm and started scolding him in a practiced, familiar way.
This is basically my idea of married bliss.
However, I think the methods of getting married are too complicated. You have the western way, with the meeting and the dating and the relationshipness and the introducing and the moving in-ing and then finally, the proposing and the wedding.
There is also the Indian way, which is his aunt sees the girl, talks to her mum, her mum talks to his mum, his mum talks to him, her mum talks to her, his aunt talks to her, his mum talks to her, and all that before the meeting, proposing and wedding.
I’ve come up with a streamlined process, combining the connection so sought in western society, and the resignation that is behind the higher success rates of Indian marriages.
When people want to get married, they choose an object to represent them. It can be anything: it could be their favourite book, it could be a bottle of oven cleaner, or a poem they wrote when they were thirteen.
People then go through these items and choose the one they relate to best. This is the connection. Next is the resignation: whoever the item that you choose belongs to, you are stuck with them, unless they do something horrific. Or if they turn out to be a dog person.
I suspect this is the way that things will go in the future when people don’t have time for courting. Instead, they’ll browse an online catalog of these items - probably named soulsearching.com or something similarly whimsical - and select the one they want, wait for a confirmation email before putting a deposit down on a house and move in together by the end of the week.
I’d probably choose a candy fan. If nothing else, we can use it when we’re old.
Around this time of year, friends tend to chatter away about their Christmas plans and preparations. Then they look at me, with a dawning suspicion. “What are your Christmas plans?” I shrug and give an apologetic smile. “Nothing much. I don’t really celebrate Christmas.”
Everytime I give away this slice of information, I’m met with horror. “Then, what do you do on Christmas?”
Well, inquiring minds need to know. Here it is.
Firstly, in preparation for Christmas, Muslims purchase reverse advent calendars. These are similar to real advent calendars but behind every cardboard flap there is just an empty space. This is to prepare us for the emptiness of non-Christmas.
The best presents at Christmas come from family and good friends. For Muslims, these good gift-givers know that we don’t celebrate Christmas, and unless they are very serious about it they won’t bother to give us any sort of outstanding gift.
Instead, we only get presents from acquaintances who feel obliged. The kind that might say hi to you in the street, but will always mispell your name.
Typical gifts are scented candles, bubble bath and German brand chocolates from Aldi.
Since we don’t have Christmas trees, we put the gifts under the kitchen table.
In the afternoon, we cut out photographs of ourselves and stick them onto Christmas cards we received, to try and trick ourselves into believing we have experienced some sort of Christmas scene.
At night, we look through the yellow pages to see which businesses are open on Christmas day and call them up to chat. If we have time, we drive round. On the way back, we drive slowly, so we can look into the windows of normal, Christmas celebrating human beings.
This last part is individual to me, before I go to bed. To make sure I’ve covered all bases, I think negative things about humanity in general, to ensure I’m not wishing goodwill to any men.
