Lal and Sue
April 29th, 2010
LAL
”In those days, it was all arranged marriages.”
(a retired teacher, living in the Northeast of England)
I grew up in the 1940s in a small village in the north of India - the Punjab. It was a very nice, very easy going environment. There were no cars and no electricity. Mostly I played outside with my friends in the fresh air. There were only about 700 people in that village and everybody knew everybody else. The whole village was like brothers and sisters and people looked after each other. We were totally dependent on our parents so we had a great respect for elders and traditions.
Most of the people in the village were farmers but my family had a business. My father owned a flour mill. Because I was from an educated family, I went to college. That was where I first met Sue. I never spoke to her but her uncle was Vice Principal at the college - an important man - so we all knew who she was. They said she had a very supportive and caring nature and that she was very intelligent. We might have talked about girls we were interested in, but never in public. And we never thought about dating; that would have been wrong…. more
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SUE
“That was our first step - to agree never to keep anything secret. That way the love gets stronger and stronger.”
(a retired homemaker, living in the Northeast of England)
My mother died when I was young. My father remarried but my new mother never treated me as if I was just her step-daughter. She belonged to a good family so she gave me the same love she grew up with. That’s why we look at people’s background when we arrange marriages: to see whether they are from a loving family so we can be sure they will love you and your children. My father and step-mother had six more children after me and I, in turn, loved my younger brothers and sisters. I used to look after all six of them. I’d comb their hair, make sure they were fed, and get them ready for school. I enjoyed doing that. I miss them, even now.
I knew my family would arrange a marriage for me. I wanted my husband to be well educated, but I didn’t think much about who he should be. I trusted my parents. They had more experience and they knew me better than I knew myself. I never thought it would be someone I didn’t like because parents never think about doing what is wrong for their children, they always think about what is best…. more
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