My mom wants me to have an arranged marriage. But I'm not sure

In India, 90% of people have arranged marriages. That can feel odd to those of us who grew up in the United States. I’m a 16-year-old, first-generation Indian American, and I feel caught between two traditions when it comes to love.

Will I go down the traditional arranged marriage route like my mother, or choose my own path?

“We had an arranged marriage,” my mother reminds me. “And guess what, I only met your dad face-to-face one week before the wedding.”

Eighteen years later, my parents are still in love.

“When I was looking for a wife,” my dad recalls, “I wanted to make sure she was adaptable, easy-going and educated. When I found your mom, I knew she was the right one and that it would work out.”

I love their stories. They remind me that, even though I've grown up in the United States, I’m still a person of two cultures.

Indian weddings are the celebration of celebrations. There are hundreds of people, tons of food, the most colorful dresses imaginable, and music.

All of it is arranged, including the marriage itself. My parents want that for me.

“I would like if you can follow tradition,” my mom tells me. “I would be sad if it was someone whose family isn’t Indian because I wouldn’t be able to connect with them.”

I want to make my own decision about who I marry, but I risk disappointing my mom. Indians tend to marry people in their own culture because it’s so engraved into tradition. How could I ever break from that?

According to the Pew Research Center, in 2010, only 2% of Indian Americans married someone who wasn’t Indian.

I couldn’t believe this statistic, so I decided to call someone closer to my age for a better perspective.

“I didn’t expect to go the arranged marriage route,” my cousin Abha said.

Abha, who lives in Texas, said she originally wanted to have a "love" marriage. But she was 23 years old, and family pressures began to mount.

Before she knew it, her parents put her on a wedding website. She wasn't excited.

“Everyone wants their Cinderella moment, and everyone wants that person who they meet and fall in love with. But sometimes that doesn’t happen,” Abha said.

She ended up finding her happily-ever-after through an arranged marriage.

So what’s the worst that could happen if I chose to have a love marriage instead of having my parents arrange it?

Our family friend Neetu chose to have a love marriage with someone from a different religion.

“Once I told my parents, there was a lot of internal chaos in the family,” Neetu said. “After I got married, many aunts and uncles told me how I’ve hurt my parents, how I’ve done wrong.”

Her family didn’t talk to her at first, but Neetu was true to herself and eventually, they came around.

I know my family wouldn’t respond like Neetu’s, but vahaan hamesha ek suncut hai. There’s always a risk.

My parents are happy. So is my cousin Abha, and a lot of other Indian families I know. This makes me more confused about which route to take.

Unlike my parents, I have more than a week to figure it out. After all, I’m only in eleventh grade.

Having a foot in two very different worlds is hard. But since I do, I’ll partake in both and see where it takes me.

This story was created in KUOW's RadioActive Intro to Journalism Workshop for 15- to 18-year-olds, with production support from Sonya Harris. Edited by Marcie Sillman.

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