This news was given to me by my cousin (who I must say took great pleasure in relating it).
The whole incident seemed to have started when my mom's colleague's son got married quite unexpectedly it seems. My mom was talking about this to her sister - one among the half dozen siblings she has, not too surprising as people at that time did not seem to have much faith in everyone surviving to adulthood.
Anyways getting back to the story, the hapless mother of the groom had an unexpected (quite possibly unapproved as well) marriage thrust upon her, sooo unexpected that she did not have gold to bestow on her new daughter-in-law. Quite a nice excuse to save on a bit of money after all gold is a man/woman's best friend (or did I get that wrong).
So my mom and my aunt (another aunt joined in the whole conversation pretty soon - stoking the flames more likely) were discussing the possibilities of how such a grave misfortune may fall upon them as well. Now my mom suddenly remembered (I'm pretty sure she never forgot it) that I had carried a few things back to chicago for a friend here on my last trip to India. Now in their mind, since I'm doing so much for this gujrati girl (in her defence she is not even close to being gujrati, she'll be hard pressed to pass off as an Indian in the first place ... anyways), I must have something going on with her. Oh the joy of leading such a simple life when all thought and reasonings are so straight forward.
My other aunt hence suggested that my mom should "buy some gold" just in case, I decide to surprise them with some good (or bad) news.
So in the end, some jeweller in some corner of India is going to be very happy, just because my mom's colleague's son is getting married. For those not exposed to Indian families, trust me you are not missing much of an experience, just surround yourselves with crackpots !!
4 comments:
Dude...don't even try to figure out the connection between mothers and gold. It's not worth it. Nor their fascination for the saas-bahu serials. :)
Listen, be happy you're a guy, and so have escaped the torture of having some chunky horrendous gold jewellry bought forcibly 'for your marriage' from the time you were little, every time the family fortune graph showed a little stir of growth! Whereas the only jewellry I revel in, costs on average Rs.20 on the roadside in Bandra :)
aarti, that anguish seems to have come from the heart ;)
tapan, words from the wise eh. hope things are going good with you
If all the money women (or women's families) spent on gold were invested into businesses....
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