Do you get harassed by your mother’s friends for being single? Does your mother burst into tears about your marital situation and make you feel guilty for not being married? Do your parent’s friends (by order of your parents) sit you down and try to find out why you’re single? Do your married friends make you feel like crap and make you feel very old for not being married? Well if you’ve answered yes to any of these questions, you’re probably in your twenties and single. I am assuming that you must be sick of the harassment, the inquisitive questions and the lectures. It sucks doesn’t it? You can’t go to a wedding or a party and not be showered with questions about your singleness. For all those reading who have no idea what I am on about, here’s a little taster for you. I will speak in feminine for the sake of the story. Here it goes.

So you are with your parent(s), going to a wedding or a 3azeema, you walk in, do your courteous greetings, then you take a seat. Oum Flan comes along, grabs the seat next to you, asks you how things are going and then dives in head first. Try to imagine the most annoying voice possible (yes they usually come acquainted with a god given squeaky annoying voice). ‘Shwakit ra7 tizowjeen? (When you going to get married then?)’ OR ‘Diyallah 3ad izowjee hata asowee rajeem lil 3iris (Enough already get married, so I know when to lose weight for the wedding)’ OR ‘Hay shinoo hay shged hilwa tal3a hel yawm, zain ma 3indich a7ad minnaaa minnaa? (Don’t you look lovely tonight, so haven’t you met anyone here or there?)’. This is usually re-enacted throughout the night by Oum Flan #2, Oum Flan #3 and sometimes Abu Flan (by order of Oum Flan). So after making you feel like a worthless piece of crap, they leave you alone to go back to their tables or seat to do some matchmaking for you. Then all of a sudden in a distance you see a potential husband - which we will call the ‘poor sod’ for the sake of this story - being dragged over by Oum Flan, she introduces the potential to you and the whole family, then insists that he sits next to you. He sits down. A polite smile is exchanged. You get slightly nauseous. Poor sod has a moustache that covers his upper and lower lip and even worse poor sod has a combover that makes your dad’s combover look captivatingly sexy. Poor sod is sitting there just as confused as you. Silence. Everyone is looking. Awkward. Yes. You decide to break the silence because you start to feel sorry for poor sod. ‘So what do you do?’, he responds. He then asks you the same question and you answer. Silence. Oum Flan is telling everyone how cute you look together. You lean over and say ‘I have to go to the washroom excuse me’ – Ladies, if ever put in this situation, this is the only polite and acceptable way to deal with it. Go to the washroom. Lock yourself in and stay in there for a minimum of 20 minutes – I guarantee you he will be gone by then. So after 20 minutes of playing snake on your cell phone you get back to the table, and he’s probably gone by then, if not, then I highly suggest you just play along with some harmless small talk. The evening ends, you are thinking thank god its over, you do your goodbyes, and you get in the car then your mother turns to you and says ‘khowsh walad hatha poor sod, moo?’, you agree for the sake of agreeing. Then as soon as you step into the house, you get a call from Oum Flan, wanting to know what you thought of poor sod. So your mother asks for your opinion again. And you simply say what you feel. ‘Mom, he’s not really my type at all’. Then all hell breaks loose, you can imagine the rest I am sure.

Now if you are an Iraqi female or male and you haven’t gone through this yet then I am happy to inform you of this situation occurring in your life very soon – Be prepared, grab a magazine for your 20 minute washroom escape. Now, as embarrassing and nerve wracking these situations are, I must defend the concept for all those worried Iraqi mothers out there. Truth is, if this happens to you, there is a possibility that the potential that was introduced to you by Oum Flan may actually be a compelling potential. And in that case I would suggest that you do a little small talk cause there is always room for more ‘types’ of people in that ‘type’ category you’ve created for yourself. But fair enough, if the potential is a scary chap who has a piece of Bagilla (Broad Beans) from his lunch stuck on his overgrown mustache – then you need to take that little detour. So why do these situations tend to happen the first place? Well, there is persistence in the Iraqi community for Iraqis to marry Iraqis, however truth is, and our community does not seem to understand the difficulty in finding a partner these days, especially if you are limiting yourself to Iraqis. It was a lot easier to get married in the days our parents got married, everyone knew everyone and everyone knew everything about everyone. nowadays it’s not so easy. Also, with time, Iraqis have changed too. Iraqi women are not as passive as they used to be and Iraqi men are a lot more independent than before. The traditional gender roles that were common in our parent’s generation have very much changed. Nevertheless, there still seems to be a conflict between some Iraqi men and women pertaining to the guiding principles of marriage and the cultural boundaries that both Iraqi men and women have experienced. There is more of an emphasis on Iraqi daughters to uphold Iraqi traditions and values, however some Iraqi sons have not been raised with that same emphasis, and consequently some Iraqi women are rebelling and stepping out of those cultural boundaries shaped by Iraqi parents and society. It was quite normal to hear of Iraqi men marrying western women however it wasn’t very common to hear Iraqi women marrying western men – now the tables are turning. Whether you think its right or not is a personal opinion, nevertheless what cannot be denied is that this is a likely consequence of living in the west, especially if you haven’t met the right ‘Iraqi’ partner.

So why hasn’t it been easy to meet the right ‘Iraqi’ partner? Well in defense of Eastern thought, the way the west has influenced Iraqis when it comes to marriage could be argued to be very problematic. Media and society has created an image of this dubious romanticism behind finding your ‘soul mate’. Which has happened to some, yet, wandering around waiting for ‘Mr. Right/Miss Right’ to come along and sweep you on your feet is not how it always works. Hollywood has also been pretty good at placing a considerable amount of importance placed on following your heart – not your mind. Truth is, most people will tell you that following their heart often left them in a divorce. And if you want to take that risk then that’s a chance you are free to take, however, I am assuming that most people who want to get married want to stay married. It’s not very difficult to confuse love for lust, that’s why it should be important to be pragmatic about the people you meet and the person you choose at the end of the day. For those singles out there wondering why they might be single, well could it bet possible that you’re being too picky? There’s nothing wrong with wanting certain characteristics and qualities in your mate, but if you are waiting for a Cindy Crawford look-alike who can cook, clean and pamper you like your mom did, or if you are looking for a George Clooney look-alike with Bill Gates bank account then you might find you’re not being very reasonable or realistic. And actually you will probably find that if you do meet someone who fits what you look for materialistically/physically and have ignored everything else you will probably end up very unhappy or divorced. And unfortunately there have been very high numbers in divorce for young Iraqi couples internationally and interestingly enough most of these marriages were love (or could be lust) marriages. So, What went wrong? Well, it’s very possible that a mutual understanding of incompatibility was concluded by some of these marriages and consequently the marriages were terminated, but in my opinion that was probably a small minority. For the majority of these divorces, the people involved were probably getting married for the wrong reasons. For the sake of settling, or for settling for what may seem to be the ideal package and ignoring compatibility questions. There is also the problem of not getting to know your partner well enough, and that again comes down to decisions that were made too early on about the relationship. Many of the subjects of these divorces (whether they know it or not) probably didn’t really understand what they were getting themselves into. Breaking news from shakomakonet headquarters: Marriage isn’t going to be an extended honeymoon, unfortunately, but that is the truth. It takes a lot of commitment, tolerance and compromise. If both partners cannot communicate and compromise about the most basic of issues then there is likeliness that it could be a problematic marriage. The reality is that marriage can be routine, boring and hard work and if you feel you are not ready to put in energy to tolerate these things then you are most likely not ready for marriage. If you have waited 28 years for a partner, then it probably isn’t worth your while to settle for anything. Don’t let people like Oum Flan get you down, but just remember, that there is not just one person out there for you, there are many people out there for you, and if you open your mind to others you will probably find it uplifting that you have made room for more potentials for you to choose from. I hope parents read this article too, because parents should understand that their dreams for their daughters and sons don’t always turn out the way they intend it to be. And there is no shame in that, being single is not a bad thing and wanting to be married is very much natural in our culture, so let your daughters and sons take their time, its better that your daughters and sons choose a partner that they are willingly convinced of, rather than rushing into a relationship just to get you off their back and end up being unhappy in the future.