Rambling Rant

I want to be very clear about the stance of this blog. I love Pakistan. I love desi culture. I adopt a lot of it into my life. That doesn't mean I have given up my own culture or customs, and it doesn't make me less of an American, less of a feminist, or weak. People in the world today have a lot of options with their lives. It's not just me - a lot of people decide to spend thier lives, or part thereof, outside thier own culture or country. Men and women volunteer with Green Peace, they feed children, they do missionary work, they work in international business of international law, they learn languages. They are STRONGER for it. The world is a better place as a result. The fact that I was first exposed to desi culture through a man I later married does not make my love of desi culture suspect. The same is true for anyone - who am I to judge. For that matter, who are YOU to judge? People convert to hinduism and live part of thier life in India to explore a love of Yoga, or worship a goddess, yet look down on me - or people in my similar situation - because they think MY love of desi culture is different or less than their own. MY motivations are questioned. I must be a sheep, I must be weak. My husband must control my life and he must not feel any similar desire to explore western culture.  Clearly the fact that I converted to Islam after meeting my husband is definitive proof of this. And while I glorify my experiences in Paksitan and with Pakistanis, I am clearly the minority because of the all-powerful and completely anonymous "I know people." So you know people who have failed marriages with desis, so you've had bad experiences in the Indian subcontinent. This is not the right place for you if that's all you want to talk about.  And what do you care what my husband does or doesn't do? Maybe he loves America, maybe he hates it. Lots of whitebread Americans hate aspects of America, too. Ever heard of the Civil War? And loving every aspect of America & western culture, or familiarizing yourself with Protestantism or hamburgers, is not a prerequisite for citizenship or marrying an American girl. How I structure MY life and MY marriage around the many varied options I am presented with is entirely up to me. A desi man who asks his wife to address his parents with traditional respectful langauge is no different than many, many, MANY Americans who hash out differences with the in-laws everyday. (Because let's remember that the ideal "preppy tennis playing lovely inlaws" is NOT the usual conception of inlaws. We have in-law tension too, remember.) And another thing. If you have experience with, say, Pakistan, you certainly shouldn't make generalizations about the entire country, or the entire people. Probably the first thing I leanred about Pakistani culture was that I could never learn everything. Pakistan is too varied, and India is even more varied. I think of it like a paintbrush smearing the whole reagion into a blur. In my mind I envision the crazy-spicy-dark-skinned-fisherman populations of the very southern tip on one end, and I think of the cinnamon-and-clove-strong-jawed-light-skinned-moutain-dwellers of Afghanistan, and I imagine that there is every possible combination in between. It's just too much. To think that ANYone can speak for ALL Indians or Pakistanis or Afghanis - even if they ARE Indian or Pakistani or Afghan, is preposterous. I don't care HOW many desis you know - you don't know enough the say desis are a certain way, or do a certain thing. Take a note from ACTUAL desis, few of whom think they know EVERYthing about thier own country or culture. How could you? I'm not saying desi culture doesn't have its share of problems. Certainly it does. This isn't the place to hash them out, or try to solve them. I suggest we all go find appropriate places to effect social change, and leave my poor blog and it's comments to its true purpose. The main purpose for my blogging is to connect with non-desis who have married into a new culture and those who truly LOVE and/or WANT to know more, explore more, expand thier horizons. And while I do believe in free speech, I must remind you that your free speech ends at my front door. You're on my doorstep right now. Welcome to the Gori Wife Life.