That's the worst advice my dear husband Mr. Loony ever gave me. No really. After dating me for years when he finally takes me to meet his parents he advises me to be myself. That could only mean trouble no? I mean an average person would take 5 mins of taking to me to tell that I should never ever be myself if I am meeting 'The Parents'.

So well, I met his parents for the first time during Diwali. We met in a food court (of all places). I am super confident Ms.Loony but then hey it's the guys parents so I was nervous as hell but then I had to be myself as per Mr. Loony so I eased up a bit and started cracking bad jokes under pressure, OK Ok your sniggering is so uncalled for! I agree, I crack bad jokes without pressure too, but that one time it went totally out of control.

Mr. loony in an attempt to show how creative I can get brings out this hand-packed fancy basket of D goodies that I had gifted to him earlier in the day. His mom in a very prim and proper social response tells me "Iski kya zaroorat thi beta." to which myself replies "You are right, iski zaroorat nahi hai." and looking at Mr. Loony I say " Wapaas de do isse." His mother of course looked like someone just told her that she was pregnant at the age ripe age of 55 and would really scream out loud. Mr. Loony being used me myself went on admiring the basket without giving a thought to my foot which was stuck in my mouth.

Forever I have been branded by the in laws as the one who has her foot growing from her mouth. This incident has be told and retold to whoever would care to listen, it has been exaggerated to an extent where some of his family members look very disappointed when they meet me and find foot on my leg which is on the ground. Heh. So girls please note, being yourself is all dandy but not when you are meeting his parents, when you are meeting his parents only two things should be done; smiling and nodding while looking at the floor. Trust me you will thank me for this one.

It's just been a few months but then lots of people (specially my mom) have been asking us to give them some good news. Of course it's good news for them for us on the other hand having kids will not be such a good news I feel. I know I know I am not getting any younger, post-30 pregnancies can be dangerous blah blah blah, but we really are just not ready to be parents yet. OK, let me give you an example. Generally when I can't sleep I ask my husband the Mr.Loony to tell me a story, he asks me to give him a few characters, generally whatever characters I give him end up having sex and the story ends up as a soft porn boring story. To avoid another soft porn story I chose a lion and a giraffe. Big Mistake.

Here is his story:

Many Many years later (he is very futuristic I must tell you) due to global warming the only two surviving animals in the jungle are a lion and a giraffe. The Lion is quite a romantic at heart and very horny too so he realises with the giraffe being the only option around he must woo her. The giraffe is very very old fashioned and needs to be swept off her feet. The horny Lion decides he can do anything for sex, so off he goes wooing the giraffe. After a few song and dance numbers, flowers and gifts, praises and poems the giraffe finally lets the lion kiss her. But now now, the lion can't really jump that high and the giraffe being old fashioned and shy won't come down. So our hero climbs up a really high tree to kiss her. He finds a branch that gives him perfect height, looks into her eyes, swears of his eternal love and just as he is about to kiss her, he slips and falls on her neck killing her instantly.

The lion looks at the dead giraffe and is heart broken (or an equivalent term for horny plans gone wrong) but then he thinks to himself 'What the hell! It's a good thing I can eat her dead too.' So he feasts upon the giraffe for many a days and is very happy for finding such good food considering there weren't any other animals around because of global warming.

To say that I was disturbed by the story is an understatement. But now I always crack up thinking of this lion who wanted to eat the giraffe dead or alive. Sigh. There you go now, he makes up a sick story and I find it funny, obviously we can't have kids. What kind of kids we would we raise with stories like these.

On my sitemeter I noticed that in addition to confused women who ask koschans such as ' If he kisses me am I pregnant' there are others who are even more confused and stupid because they search for koschans such as 'If he puts mangalsutra am I married.'

For the benefit of such people , I and a few newly wed friends of mine (which includes my dear ex roomie Ms.Malhotra have compiled a ready reckoner sort of list here.If you answer 'Yes' or nodded sadly in agreement or suddenly go and bang you head on the nearest wall in response to any of the following then my dear reader, I pronounce you married and sacrificed:

You know you are married..

• When you wear the engagement ring, the mangalsutra, the sone ka chudhas, the diamond necklace giving major competition to baapi da, instead of wearing strange jewellery you picked up from random stores or exotic street vendors ;)


• When suddenly your bank balance is in the negative and the chances of it ever going back to it’s pre wedding high are non existent, thanks to the credit card bills. We all waited so long for this day just so that we could use marriage as an excuse to buy the overpriced things.


• When just because you are wearing a saree, mangalsutra and aforementioned jazz young boys and girls can call you aunty and walk away smiling, you also smile back coyly like the perfect newly wed bride when actually underneath that saree and jazz there is the old you which wants to beat them and say ‘Teri maa ki!’ or ‘Aunty kisko bola bey!”


• When you are judged every now and then, of course the husband had a bee line of eligible women he could have married but he chose you, so you need to be judged against them, the Mehtas' loving daughter who cooks the best chiken tikkas, the Agarwals' daughter who is oh so pretty!


• When suddenly your phone bills drop to 3 digits from 5 digits.


• When you have a mummy and a mummyji at a same social gathering or function and you don’t know whom to give more attention.


• When you go to some random distant cousin’s shaadi wearing a really heavy lehenga giving competition to the bride, just because you wanna use your shaadi ka outfit and you better use it before your newly wed tag is not so new anymore
  


• When suddenly you have relatives on your facebook friends list, aaaaaaaaaargh, all his aunties and uncles are now your friends and in some cases you actually do have had the courage to not accept their request then keep faking how you never got it!!


• When you enthusiastically bend and touch every tom, dick and harry’s feet since they have grey hair and are related to the husband, damn isn’t there any better way to show you respect (and we don’t actually really totally disrespect you then why the hell do we have to show our non existing respect).
  


• When your ratio of number of meetings with friends and relatives becomes inversely proportional to the one before marriage!


• When everything you mother in law cooks is 'so yummy! I have to learn this from you!'


• When instead of going and spending the entire Sunday at the spa followed by a coffee out with friends and a late night movie, you spend it putting your house in order! or instead of wondering which movie to watch at a surprise stay over at your friends place at Bandra, you are wondering what you can cook for dinner!!

After I have been married a lot of people (mostly well meaning) have asked me "So what is your name now?" to which I politely reply "I am retaining my maiden name." I have been getting mixed reactions about this, some people shrug it off, some people raise their eyebrows (including my parents!) but the worst kind question my decision. It's one thing to want to know why I decided to retain my maiden name, it's totally another to question my decision.

OK, so let me tell you one thing: My name is My business, really, that's surprising huh? I am sure there are plenty of women who go about embracing the hubby's last name or as in our (Sindhi) custom even changing their first name without a thought. I have no opinion or rather I have no time to sit and judge their decision. As for myself, it would kill me. My blog, my email ids (official and personal), visiting cards, passport, bank accounts, trading accounts, assets, insurance policies and what not. Why should I go through the pain of updating so much even if it can be done with minimum effort! I sign Rohra,not Kusum. To me 'Rohra' has a nice ring to it. I've been arguing with hubby that our name plate will read 'His last name and Rohra'. To me Kusum Rohra is a brand. I am not going to change that. My marriage is the most important part of my life, read that properly, it is *the* most important thing in my life, still I see no reason to change my name specially since my loony heart loves it.


Nothing wrong with my hubby's last name but I see no logic in giving up mine. If I ever get bored with being a 'Rohra' or feel like I need a change I will change it but that will be my decision and not something that comes in the package when one marries.So people who think that a woman who is old enough to make her own people can't take her own decision about her name, let me kindly ask you to shut the eff up. Thank you.