November 11, 2010

Us and Them

Pink Floyd, The Dark Side of the Moon 1973

After yesterday's theme of Totally Serious, I need to lighten things up.  What better way than discussing the festival of lights, Diwali?  .

Awhile back, a fellow blogger who also shares the love for Men of the Foreign Extraction (Gori Girl, perhaps?  Indian Ties?) and is also in an Indian/American marriage linked to a group site/bloggie thingie whereby all of us gals who had legally hitched up to the Masala Marriage wagon train could post our blog links.  I thought about it, but hesitated.  I do not post much about my own little Masala Marriage, mostly because there is not much to report.  As I have written about in the past, this is complicated by the fact that Manoj comes from the relatively teensy Syrian Christian ethnic group and as such, came into my life already Christmas and Easter Trained. Sure, we had some details to hammer out (Santa, Rudolph, Peeps), but overall, we are the most boring of the most plebeian of Masala Marriages.  I would feel like a fraud purporting this blog reports on such fascinating things as "diversity" or "culture".  Except in the kitchen.  Folks, we like it hot n' spicy in the kitchen.  Although, I probably did not need an Indian husband for that. 

Ahem.

Are you still left wondering why I do not plumb the murky depths of my multi-cultural marriage for interesting blog fodder?  Really?

Gentle Reader, perhaps, the following exchange will convince you otherwise
:
Scene: An average suburban home in Olathe KS.  A man enters his home and addresses his wife.

Husband, in a Lovely Hue of "Sepia": Um, when is Diwali?
Wife, in a Rich Hue of "Vampire": You realize *I* am the White person in this relationship, right?
Mocha Brown Husband: Ha Ha.  No, really.  When is Diwali?
Pasty White Wife: *Blink * Blink*

Action: While Wife resists the gluttonous temptation to openly mock her husband, said Husband looks the information up on Google and finds out that Diwali is the next day.
 
Mocha Brown Husband: It's tomorrow.

Wife waits for some enlightenment as to the reason for this entire exchange.  After all, Gentle Reader, in the entire 10 years together, this couple has never celebrated Diwali, much less discussed it at any sort of length, so why does he care so much now?  Christ on toast!  He consulted Google, so it must be important.   


The ZhuZhu hamsters in the Wife's brain begin powering up.  Creak....creak....creak....

???????????

Eureka!!!

Pasty White Wife:  Um, I am going to take a wild guess and say that someone at work asked you about Diwali and as the Token Indian, you feel compelled to offer up the appropriate information, huh?  Even though you are a Catholic from Kerala who really did not celebrate Diwali much back home, much less here.

Husband hangs head.

Mocha Brown Husband: Yes.
Pasty White Wife: Dude!  This was totally your chance to demonstrate the rich diversity that is India. The fact that India is an amazing tapestry of religions and culture interwoven through the centuries!  Fail!

In conclusion, my Very Special Indian and I celebrated the festival of lights by drinking cheap wine, eating take-out pizza (with pepperoni, no less) and settling on the couch in front of Real Time with Bill Maher.  I did light up a Yankee candle.

Does that count?

9 comments:

Moderndayhermit said...

Hahahahahaha, I love it!

~ifer said...

That is too funny. My favorite part was when you asked him if he realized you were the white person in the relationship.
So now I have to go google and find out what exactly Diwali is.

Average Jane said...

That is awesome! It's sort of like when I'm more interested in Day of the Dead than my half-Mexican husband.

He's right there on finding the good Mexican restaurants, though.

Dawn said...

Did I tell you the story of Terrance and I interviewing child care's for Em and the response I got when I asked about their policy/practice on Diversity?

"Um, We don't celebrate Kwanzaa - But we could if you wanted us too"

Stares from Both Dawn and Terrance.

"Neither of us celebrate Kwanzaa - we celebrate Christmas"

Awkward and long silence.

Olivia said...

Hahaha...

I wish we lived close enough to share a spicy meal. That's how we cook in our house, too, and even the toddler loves the habenero spiked sauces.

cj said...

Great Post I found this absolutely hilarious!! By the way wish you could have the appropriate Pink Floyd music track playing in the back ground to each post. Now that would be cool.

LuAnn said...

Awesome, awesome, awesome post! Made my Friday morning. Thank you.

kreed said...

hahahaha! Thanks for the chuckle!

But I still don't know what Diwali is. Guess I better Google it!

Faiqa said...

Hahahaha... awesome. This reminds me of when people find out my parents are from Pakistan and tell me that they really love hummus. Your husband is far more accommodating than I am. :-)