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Tradition or love? CATHERINE PORTER From behind the wheel of their
white van, Faheem says he wants to spend more time at home. His wife, Tabassum, longs to
spend more time out of the house. From the back seat, tucked
between his two dozing nieces, 30-year-old Asim Bukhari offers up his goal
for 2003. "I'm going to get
married." To whom? He pauses, staring out into the
chilly "I don't know." Asim does know how he's going to
do it though. The same way his older brother Faheem did 10 years ago and his
younger brother Kazim only last summer. An arranged marriage. He will call his sisters halfway
around the world in the sprawling city of First, they will make the
necessary inquiries and phone calls, selecting the bridal candidates like
shiny perfect shells on the beach. Then, he will fly "back home" to
If her parents choose him too,
they will be feeding one another Pakistani sweets on their wedding night
within three weeks. "Then, I won't feel
lonely," he says. "I'll have someone who will listen to me and
support me." It's a familiar yearning,
fulfilled, for many, in unfamiliar ways. This is a story about
differences. It is about customs many of us
have grown up with being shuffled like cards and redealt into radically new
hands. About looking at our lives differently, learning how others live in
different ways that can be as fulfilling as they seem strange. And fittingly, this is a story
about marriage and the different ways people approach an institution that is
one of the most basic, the most challenging and ultimately the most enriching
in any society. The notion of marriage is one of humanity's constants: we all
hope to find our soulmates. But, as we will see during Asim's voyage over the
next eight days, the practice of it is a tapestry we often weave differently,
adapting to the pattern of our own times, culture, hopes and dreams. So, that much said, what do we
know about Asim Bukhari? He stands 5 foot 10, has milky
brown skin that darkens at his neck and elbows, weighs 150 pounds and wears
jeans, checkered shirts with collars and small, square rimless glasses to
frame his almost black eyes. Like many new immigrants to this
country, he lives in two worlds — the "back home" of his childhood,
where people define themselves through family and honour, and his new home of
Canada, where people are driven by the motto that a career, a home, a life —
anything can be remade at a moment's notice. In one world, the elders are
revered and the young are "children" who don't make decisions on
their own. In the other, youth and independence are idolized, and their
grandparents are shuffled off to old-age homes. But first, his first home. Asim
was born on When he was still all arms and
legs, Asim's favourite place to sleep on muggy Asim has always been a dreamer.
He sleeps through morning appointments, absent-mindedly forgets lists, makes
decisions one minute only to undo them the next. He is easily influenced and
very sentimental. His family says his quick temper
comes from the red pepper flakes he showers on his food. He loves Clint
Eastwood movies and maple walnut ice cream. He is shy around strangers, but
once he knows you, watch out for his caustic wit and playful humour. He'll
think nothing of tying a bright scarf around his head and jiggling to the
beat while everyone else watches. He was clearly his mother's
favourite. The Bukhari family's exodus to Eight years later, he was
followed by his sister Saima, who was joining her husband in And then, in 1998, it was Asim's
turn. Faheem, head of the family since their father's death, had sponsored
both his brothers and their mother. So, on a steaming summer night,
Asim jostled through The first thing they noticed
about their new country was the orderly way traffic moved on Highway 401. "You have a lane and no one
can come in it. That's amazing. And the cars were going so fast. I was
shouting to Faheem to be careful," Kazim says breathlessly from the Bukhari
living room couch, beneath a framed photograph of his own wedding day last
summer. At 27, he is the youngest of the Bukhari clan and the most talkative.
Driving on Canadian highways was
one of the few things Faheem left out in the home movies he mailed home
regularly — a kind of " The Bukhari brothers felt
assimilated long before touching down on the landing strip. "Faheem used to joke that
we were already in They moved into Faheem's new
rose-bricked home in a There were concrete banks called
sidewalks where people could walk without the threat of passing vehicles. But
you hardly needed them. The streets were so quiet. There were no nasal shouts
of subzi wallahs, pushing their wooden carts with vegetables for sale.
No motorized rickshaws, buzzing on three wheels around corners. No little
boys stripped to the waist, playing cricket with tennis balls wrapped in
electric tape in the rain. Instead of the sugar-cane
vendors who crushed the tall stalks into juice at their wooden, road-side
stands, there was Tim Hortons. Instead of tailors in small stalls who pulled
the measuring tape from around their necks to check your waist and shoulders
before stitching up cotton pants and flowing shirts, there was Sears. For the first time, they each
had a room of their own, a car of their own. There were some details that
would take getting used to. For instance, women sat beside men on the buses
without anyone even noticing. Gay men paraded down the street; straight men
didn't hold hands in public. Asim has hidden the photographs
of his friends hugging each other in the ocean just outside of "Over here, they think you
are gay," he says, eyes widening as he pulls them out. He hasn't
examined these photos for years. "When I look at these pictures, I am
shocked. My reaction is `What are they doing?' Five years makes a big
difference." At 26, Asim had a commerce
degree and was a computer teacher at a But Asim's luck wasn't as good.
His mother fell ill with pancreatic cancer. Barely three months after they
had arrived, he took her back home. He returned a year later in
mourning and enrolled in the computer science program at The timing couldn't have been
worse when he graduated two years later, in August, 2001. Nortel Networks was
crashing, signalling the tailspin of the high-tech sector. Every company he
called told him the same thing, "We are not hiring right now, but we
will keep you in mind." So, he began working full-time
at his brother's stores. It was then that he met Farah.
She was one of his friend's classmates at One day, after his friend's car
broke down and he called Asim for a lift, the three of them went out for a
coffee. It was the way she spoke Urdu
that snagged Asim. Although her family also came from "She didn't know how to
pronounce words," says Asim. "It was cute." In some ways, she was more North
American than Pakistani. She had been living in "I used to joke with her
and say, `Shut up.' She'd say, `You shut up.' I'd say, `If you were a
Pakistani girl, you'd just keep quiet. You don't have the right. You are a
woman.' She'd go, `So, I'm not a Pakistani girl. I'm not going to shut up
when you say shut up,'" he says smiling, pulling out two photos from his
wallet. They were taken in a booth at Cedarbrae Mall. Their cheeks are
pressed together and both their eyes squinting as they laugh. They began to see one another in
secret — calling each other's pagers and setting up meetings in coffee shops
or along the lakeshore. He'd often take her to a park near his house to sit
with their legs hanging over a cliff. He never phoned her at home.
That was an unspoken understanding. Her parents would be livid. They were of
the opinion that good Pakistani girls do not date. Neither do good Pakistani
boys, for that matter. It would bring dishonour to the family name. (To protect her honour, Asim has
asked that her real name not be used. Farah is a pseudonym.) So, even after he proposed to
her in the middle of a coffee shop, he didn't reveal his feelings to Faheem
until the subject of marriage was raised one night six months later. Dishing out the meal his wife
Tabassum had cooked that afternoon, Faheem announced it was time for Asim to
get married. He was 30. He had no responsibilities. He lived in Faheem's
home, paid no rent, worked in his shop. "What is he waiting
for?" says Faheem, 37. If they could find a nice girl
here they would. Otherwise, he should return to Asim gathered the courage to
announce he already had a girl in mind. He wanted Faheem, as the head of the
Bukhari household, to approach Farah's family the appropriate way — with a
formal proposal for marriage. The night in February they drove
over to Farah's The meeting did not go well. Her parents said little over the
meal, while Farah ran back and forth to the kitchen with steaming plates of
chicken curry and warm chapatis. Faheem brought up the issue of marriage
twice. They didn't bite. Before they left, Faheem
provided Farah's parents with all his telephone numbers — home, work, cell.
If they had any questions about Asim, he'd be happy to oblige. They never called. "Her mother was mad. She
said, `How dare you get a proposal? You are just 21 years old. You are not
supposed to get married. You are supposed to be studying,'" says Asim. "Her mom said I wasn't
highly educated. They are looking for a highly educated guy, with a very good
job. Not someone who is working at his brother's store. Plus, there's the
cultural thing, too." Not only was he not Sindhi, he
was a mohajir, an immigrant. His parents had come to After two weeks, when the
Bukhari phone had not rung, the family took it as a rejection. "Basically, people don't
say no. If they don't call you, they don't get back to you, it means
no," says Asim. It was time to accept tradition
and go back to The months passed. Asim decided
to switch careers and enrolled in an accounting program at He quietly hoped. When Farah told him that her
mother was back in There was another trip to
Farah's home, this time alone. And a following phone call peppering Faheem
with more questions. Asim knew from his own sisters'
marriages that a girl's family had to carefully investigate every marriage
proposal before accepting. But this was crossing the line.
His family's honour was at stake. "How many times we went
there and they would never come to my house," he says indignantly.
"My sisters said, `You know they're not going to let her marry you, so
why allow them to disrespect you and your family?'" He was heartbroken. So was
Farah. They both wept on the phone. He asked if she would go against her
parents' wishes. She wouldn't. He understood that. Neither would he. Family
is to Pakistani culture what freedom is to North Americans. Dejected, he called Aapi in "I played my game and I
lost. So now you do it," he told her. He'd marry any girl she lined up
for him. He could even do it over the phone like a family friend in Faheem stepped in. He persuaded
Asim to at least fly back and meet the girl first. "He said, `This is not a
joke. Maybe you think you can do it now, but when you get married, there are
lots of things you might not like in her. How she laughs, how she
talks,'" Asim says. "I realized he is right." That was last winter. Since then, Asim has turned 31.
A month after his birthday, he was sworn in as a Canadian citizen in an He made plans to return to What would happen? In a few
months, would he be married? What would his wife be like? His only stipulation was that
she be educated. That way she could adapt to
Canadian life more easily. And he'd like her to have long hair, like Farah. "If it's not, that's not a
problem. I'm not picky," he says. His family has a more detailed
wish list. Asim's bride should be a rational person, to measure his
impulsiveness, his younger brother says. She should be as good at saving
money as he is at spending it, says his older brother. She should be patient
and have a good memory, as everyone in the family is forgetful, his sister
offers quietly. She should be competent, says
his sister-in-law Tabassum, emptying rice out of a large metal pot in the
family kitchen. She chooses each word tentatively. After nine years here, she
still isn't comfortable with the strange, hard-sounding language. "I think he is a
baby," she says. "He doesn't make decisions for himself." Five days before he is set to
leave, Asim goes shopping with Tabassum, his sister Saima and their toddlers,
Fathima and the excitable Samir. The first stop is Moores
Clothing For Men. Red balloons dot the air-conditioned store. There is a
clearance sale. While both women sink shyly into the background tending to
their babies, Asim flies around the store like a hummingbird. It takes him less than four
minutes to choose clothes for his wedding reception: a black, Italian
silk-lined three-button suit. He stands before the mirror, nods his head and
mumbles softly that he will take it. He selects a pair of black,
laceless dress shoes, approves a reversible leather belt, examines the
quality of a bundle of dress socks. He quickly picks out a wedding tie and
shirt, and just as quickly changes his mind when Tabassum points out the
combination she likes better. A half hour later, the total
flashes from the store's cash register: $1,019.90. Asim pulls out a white
envelope from his pocket, filled with crisp $50 and $20 bills he withdrew
from the bank that morning. They return to a buzzing home,
where Asim's nieces and nephews are finishing their dusk prayers on small
rugs rolled out on the kitchen floor. They rip through his bags. With Fathima squirming on his
lap, Faheem inspects Asim's purchases. His new suit, he is told, is getting
altered. "Black?" Faheem says.
"Black is for a funeral." Asim looks around the room for
support. Suddenly, he is unsure. "Should I call them and change
it?" he asks. The night before his flight,
Asim stays up late packing. Faheem helps him stock two suitcases with
presents for the family. There are Betty Crocker cook sets for his nieces,
lipstick and eye shadow for his sisters, Gillette razors and shaving foam for
his brothers-in-law, a calculator and sunglasses for his nephews, and
super-size boxes of chocolate for anyone he's missed. They weigh the bags on a
bathroom scale to ensure each slips just below the airline's limit. After
years of travelling back and forth, they have this down to a refined art.
Asim's carry-on knapsack is bursting. He will carry his laptop computer and
digital camera with him in the passenger compartment. "We always carry the
maximum," he says. "It's tradition." He is daydreaming about the
upcoming reunion with his sisters when his pager goes off. It's Farah. She wants to meet him tomorrow
before his plane leaves. So, the next morning, Asim
drives down to a park near her work and sits with her in the car for an hour.
She is also travelling to When he returns home, his pager
goes off again. This time she has sent a text message. "I love you," it
flashes. The Bukharis are back in the
family van, whizzing along the 401. They are seeing Asim off on his voyage.
Faheem, again at the wheel, is feeling nostalgic. Aapi's two daughters are getting
married on Aug. 22. They are planning to find Asim a bride by then and hold
his wedding reception on the same day. It will be one giant celebration. "I wish I was going. It
could have been a lot of fun," Faheem sighs. But they are moving to a
new house in His two daughters are in the
back seat again, along with Saima's daughter, 5-year-old Bisma. They are playing a game: What
will Asim's wife be like. 6-year-old Ifrah:
"Friendly. Not crazy either." 7-year-old Ariba: "I want
her to be a little bit funny." Bisma: "What if she has
only one eyeball?" They erupt into giggles. Asim sits quietly in the front
passenger seat. He bites his nails. It's a habit his mother used to scold him
for. He feels nervous. His family
puts it down to regular travel squeamishness. And that he is leaving some
bills unpaid. But it's not money that is
turning his stomach upside down. It's Farah. The small pilot light of hope
has been reignited. "I still love her," he
says. "I'm going to try one last time." He doesn't know how. He'll ask
Aapi in When he steps on to the plane,
he wonders what outcome this voyage will bring. In a month's time, will he be
married to a girl he doesn't know yet, but will learn to love? Or will he be
married to the girl he already loves? |
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