MEET THE PATELS : MISTRESS MANIFESTO FILM REVIEW

What do you do when your mother considers herself to be a successful matchmaker herself, but you can't seem to find the "right one" to marry and you really want mom off your back?

MEET THE PATELS is a documentary film that focuses on Patels, apparently one of the most common East Indian surnames in the United States and a name which also implies a certain caste. Handsome East Indian-American men experience a clash of cultures, the tradition of arranged marriage or finding their own partner in life, called a "love marriage." The idea is that if two people are matched well they will come to love each other, or learn to love each other, or discover what love is together. Generally, arranged marriages is how their parent's met. Aren't they happy? Doesn't a person's attitude has much to do with their parent's marriage, the marriage they have judged to be good or bad?

One thing that impresses me about East Indian Matchmaking in the United States is that the potential mates are often willing to move their lives to another city and state to make the match.  Sometimes the bride or groom, mostly the bride, comes from India to a new marriage and a new country.  What an adjustment that must be!  This means that family will either be distanced or follow.

I enjoyed this one.  It does have a happy ending. 

MAIL ORDER BRIDES - INTERNATIONAL MEET UPS - MATCHMAKERS - THE BUSINESS OF MARRIAGE : SPECIAL TOPIC

Over the last several years, rather than keep to the usual Mistress (or Mantress) of the Month format, I've been covering special topics that I think will be of interest to my steady readers in December - the Holidays.

I know that the holidays are busy.  I know that some of my readers, who are involved with others who are married and elsewhere, may feel especially bored and lonely.  The Coronavirus-19 Pandemic has put extra stress on everyone, particularly those who have had to sequester themselves without visits from the one they love and lust after. Too many Zoom meetings already.  I wonders if we will ever safely date.  Can we even kiss someone we just met?

This might be a good time to read this blog from start to finish if you have never and think about what life as a Mistress (or Mantress) has been for some of those who couldn't keep their lives a secret because they were just too famous or they themselves wrote a book about that experience. Maybe this will help you assess your own relationships, your needs and desires.  Maybe you're one of those people who think being Kept is something you would never do. Or maybe you're trying to decide if you stay or go in an extramarital relationship. Remember that for every one person who is known, there are likely hundreds who have arrangements, and many thousands who've had an affair.

You may be NMNK and happy or you may long for a partner in life.  There's a question you must ask yourself...

Do you want to be married?

If you're someone who wants to be married but you just can't seem to get a relationship going in that direction, you may have considered what's out there - Internet based dating clubs which have their basis in what used to be called Lonely Hearts Clubs! There are many opportunities to meet someone long distance, such as someone from another country who is actually still living there.  These long distance connections are aided by companies, hundreds of them from what hear, that charge mostly  Westernized men to meet mostly "foreign" women.

One of the stereotypes we deal with as a society is that men are marriage adverse and women want to be married and have to be patient, or be tricky, or extra sexy, or something in order to snare a resistant man. Is a man who is in love resistant just because he's male?

In truth, there are many  good men who want to be married because they see the value in it. Some men flourish in a good marriage. Others just seem to have no luck. Are they just "too picky"? Is their wish list just too difficult to fulfill? Maybe having no luck works in their favor - for a while.  A man who has had a hard time meeting Ms. Right might just appreciate a good woman more than a man who is spoiled by women.  Any woman who has been baited, hooked, and then thrown back into the sea by a man whose just no good, who has issues with commitment or does this to flatter his ego or impress his lousy friends, wants one of those good men - a keeper!  Some women are willing to share a good man too.

So this month I want to look at the men who desire marriage so much they have given up on it all happening organically and naturally and have decided to try to import a partner for life.  They seek a woman who will be the ultimate gift to themselves!  And I want to look at the whole arranged marriage deal in this, the 21st century!

Missy