The Singapore visit had many pluses. One of them was meeting up with my batch mates after 18 long years...
Not close friends, but still guys who I was friendly with.
We met at the Changi Airport after my last leg of scheduled appointments and talked nonstop for hours...
We found that one of the hard-core Marxists guys in our batch had migrated to the US and had married an American. We laughed at the irony of that!
Then about a shy, studious guy who had come out of the closet and was writing about inclusion of gay men in the system and that too in our own prude state of Kerala...
We wondered about that ...
We reminisced about the college and the places around it, Pappachan's thattu kada, the juice shop outside, the valley which was privy to a number of budding romances!
It was time well spent. They talked about their children with pride and I talked of mine too...We talked about those who had arranged marriage and those who had to do a bit of talking (read fighting) to make their parents understand and finally agree to it.
At the end of our gupshup, when it was time for me to board my plane, I asked them, "So why didn’t you guys bring your wives along?"
"It was too late," they said, which was true, my flight was at 2am and I could be free only at 10.30pm to reach the airport around 11pm.
But probing further I found that one of them had not mentioned that he was meeting an old classmate of the opposite sex, a convenient omission of sorts...
That pained me and took some or most of the joy away...
I guess honesty is a virtue that isn't prevalent these days and a male-female friendship is still seen with some mistrust.
Is the fault with us women that we view any form of friendship that our menfolk have with a lot of misgiving or that the men can just not have open discussions with their counterparts?
What do you think?
I have been in touch with more males from my college than females and the reason for that is simple, there are fewer of my female batch mates on FB and other social networking sites...
I sincerely wish I could be in touch with more girls of my batch and wish the guys would be more honest.
(P.S: I was honest, I had talked to my husband about meeting these guys, so girls can be honest!)
8 comments:
i'm gonna blame the wife for the most part. must be real clingy. for the rest, maybe he hasnt earned the trust
Hmmm sometimes circumstances are such that it is better to omit such truths! You know I had a very good fren in PG once he got married he had simply cut off from me. When I spoke to few other batchmates of mine I realised that his wife was totally against him being frenz with a girl.
I was hurt by the fact that instead of making her see the right point of view he agreed to her but then that's a personal choice he made!! Am not saying that ur frenz wife might be of that sort but why don't u give him the benefit of doubt?
But yes meeting old frenz is always fun! Specially when u see them making radically different choices it can be hilarious :D
Wow thatz nice :)
I think nt all men r like that .. it does depend on the understanding they share between themselves. I hv also seen wives who r really possessive and don't like it when their husbands meet others. No generic opinion there :)
True...though sometimes I think what would be my reaction if my husband went to meet his old college mate. I think I would be so happy for him that he has got in touch with her ...maybe I would keep asking...but yes, I would force him to go to meet her to.
It is all a matter of choice...to each his/her own...but still isn't there something called freedom...and personal space!
It must have been so much fun meeting old batchmates:-)!!!!
Women to a certain extent do not trust their men completely. I wdnt at all have a problem abt my hubby meeting his old batchmate[girl] once in a while[most of the time I'm urging him to go].
At my house the problem is other wya around....he hates letting me out of his sight;-/
But I remember a blogger writing abt her husband who used to go meet his friend[woman] alone atleast once or twice a month & how she hated it. I sort of cdnt find fault there....can u????
no poinions on this since both men and women can be really clingy at times..
it all depends on the situation..personally I would anyday prefer honesty but I also understand when some say that they would rather not tell because it would lead to arguments...
(wondering what if wives or hubbies got to know that one is meeting or has met an old friend of the opposite sex without telling them?)wont that lead to unnecessary misunderstandings?
*sigh* its complicated! only those who do this would understand I suppose..
I like your relationship:) honesty is the foremost thing:)
How nice to know that you got to meet your batchmates,Sindhu. I'm hoping I'll get to meet some of mine too when I'm in Delhi next week.
As for the male-female friendship, it is sad that many of us still have that mental block.
I don't know - I think it depends.. Both of us are open about who we meet and interact with.. But I know men who smoke and lie through their teeth to their wives about it. I find it difficult to understand. I think it depends on the relationship, I guess. How much trust and how close one is, I guess.
Meeting old friends is so much fun, isn't it? I have so many friends who I haven't met in years!
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