Please Pakistani women, stop uploading stale post-wedding pictures of yourself 4 months later, nobody wants to view those.
I don’t understand why women have to pretend to be someone that they’re not, just because of a ‘norm’ or a stupid level to ‘gauge’ how ‘nice or not nice’ a woman is. Who is society to judge a person? Do you judge how many women a man has slept with before he marries? NO! You just respect him because ‘oh wow, finally he wants to settle down. What a good man he must be!’ Over here, yet again, you judge a man by his willing-ness to settle down, or not settle down. Why is our society so judgemental?
So coming back to my point: a woman has to become someone SHE’S NOT (mostly I’ve seen, as ALOT of my friends who got married were completely different people, and it’s almost sad to see them compromise THIS MUCH to just ‘fit in’. Well, why do you have to fit in when you can be the absolute best version of yourself? Who told you to become someone you’re not? Why would you let someone, who hasn’t ever seen your struggles, your hardships, your best and your worst, dictate to you as to who you SHOULD BE when you go to another house? Did you change for your mother? No. Did you change for your father? No. So why are you so eager to change to please someone who hasn’t even seen half of how you got to where you are.
BE YOURSELF AND SEE HOW MUCH MORE PEOPLE WILL LOVE YOU AT YOUR WEDDING DAY! NOBODY LIKES A FAKE BRIDE, THEY MAKE FUN OF YOU LATER, TRUST ME.
What I absolutely hate about these wedding ‘superficialities’ is how women pretend that this is just the trophy that they’re getting for all the hard-work that they’ve done, that it all leads to this, like this is the END. This is the ultimate goal. No please. It’s not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is to become the best version of yourself. The ultimate goal is to please the Lord, through humanity, through spirituality and through doing the best that you can, for others. The true ultimate goal is to make others happy with your mere presence and whatever help you can give to make them comfortable and happy. The ultimate goal is not to get married, have children and die.
Secondly, I see all these women uploading all those ‘stale wedding photos’ as I call them, after they’ve gotten married. There was so much more that I wanted to discuss about these weddings, therefore I started with what I thought was the main point to be discussed. Women who upload all these stale wedding pictures don’t realise that when it was freshly baked out of the oven and the events were happening, people were only curious THEN and at THAT TIME. After the marriage, everyone has gotten to see pictures from here and there, and there’s zero curiosity to see what the bride/groom wore and how they laughed with each other, sipped coke with each other, looked at each other, yada yada yada. It’s kind of too mushy for me, in fact, I mean everyone has to get married someday and yes you definitely upload pictures once you get time. But, seriously 1001 pictures of you doing the same thing over and over again?
WHY HAS SOCIAL MEDIA APPROVAL BECOME SO IMPORTANT FOR US TO BE HAPPY?
I don’t understand the phenomenon behind ‘putting up pictures and getting more likes equals more happiness that the world has seen how happy we are’. Why can’t it just be you face-to-face being happy with your family and friends, those who actually matter? Because believe me 90 percent of the people who actually like your pictures, are just loathing your expensive dress and function, and making funny comments about how your face is demented, or the groom looks silly and has a pointed nose, or how you look like a witch smiling. Nobody cares, nobody appreciates, and people honestly don’t feel good for others anymore. Not making a generalisation, I’ve seen judgemental and hypocritical human beings in Pakistan way more than they exist abroad. Because of the ‘Pakistani judgemental bubble’ that we live in.
Coming back to the point, stale pictures? Please refrain. They just spam my newsfeed and make me sad for you. Also, I think it’s a way to say ‘PLEASE SEE HOW PRETTY I LOOKED ON MY WEDDING AND SEE HOW I LAUGHED AT MY WEDDING AND HOW MUCH FUN I HAD!’. It’s okay to share a few pictures with your loved ones, I’m not a total bitch. However, 4 months after you’re married and living life all over again and people have forgotten about you, and you’re trying to ‘revive’ the magic, uh-it doesn’t happen sweety. You’re gone now, it’s someone else’s wedding dates now. Byeeeee!
Thirdly, and lastly, I would want to add about the wedding photography and they hype that it has gotten over the past few years.
WHY ARE PEOPLE PUTTING SO MUCH EFFORT INTO LOOKING GOOD FOR THE PICTURES AND VIDEOS, AND LESS EFFORT INTO ACTUALLY LIVING THE MOMENT?
It’s really sad to see that the bride and groom are not living the moment that perhaps means so much more and SHOULD mean so much more to them than a mere dinner with people happily snapping pictures of themselves and the bride/groom, eating their hearts out and then excusing themselves from the place.
Whenever I enter a wedding hall, I honestly get so depressed. It’s like a function where nobody gives a shit about the matrimonial of two people, but about the food, the venue, and who looks better than who! It’s a competition, it’s a rat race to wear the most expensive clothing, to have the best make-up and hairdo. And the hairdo’s are THE WORST! Same hair that these pathetic beauty salons make, there’s no age-limit to their side flicks and back-combing. The aunties and the kids, all have the same hair, with glitter and flowers added sometimes.
The food is the only part I wait for at such weddings. And not to forget, the bride and groom have entered, and the cameramen and videographers and pushing people away from them, not letting them greet, or see the couple. They are being PUSHED away so that they may film the couple, and memorise (like a life code) the walk, the talk, the laughter, the EVERYTHING of the couple. Sheesh, I really hate how weddings are conducted in Pakistan.
In this personal rant, I just have one point to make: why can’t weddings be an event of happiness, and less an event of traditions and social media? Why can’t we stop thinking about uploading shit on social media, and instead live the moment? Why do we need approval by others to live our live to the best, and enjoy it to the maximum?
I JUST DON’T GET IT.
So I plan, therefore, that on my wedding, I’ll have those extra events (no Mayon types, blekh) in which you can ACTUALLY have some fun. Maybe a Girls Night, maybe a Karaoke Night (with bands performing, YES) and maybe a Ghazal night for the oldies (let’s not exempt them from the fun okay, they’re humans too). I have a firm belief in being happy, and true happiness lies in human beings and feelings, and not in social media and ‘faking it’, as I call it.
Unfortunately, the only thing that I’m going to hate is the hiring of professional photographers and videographers. Everything is fun and games and they’re allowed to film and photograph. But if someone says, ‘baji please side pe hojayein video bun rahi hai’, I’ll make sure he gets a tight slap and half-salary and is told to leave.
