“Someone very dear to me in Kathmandu suggested the When Harry Met Sally-rip off Bollywood movie Hum Tum as a manual for relationships.”

I can publicly own up to it – and i love Hum Tum much more than Harry Met Sally!

and I still vote for love (however we define it) over physical urges – though would like to think the two can together for the longest period.

I don’t understand what we are disagreeing with here:

“Ravi, yes, take your point about public displays, but I am going to touch on very but I am going to touch on very , very shaky grounds here, isn’t it also the case that there many cases where perhaps you might still make room for extra-curricular affairs because wives/girlfriends didn’t go every where.””

I am not suggesting affairs don’t happen every where…

I am saying … and i just have to be blunt here now so strike me down for being so explicit …

Men and women sometimes (because we live in a conventional world most of the time) will be shy to demand things within a relationship becuase they will try and maintain sexual roles – and when they want something more – and are too shy or repressed to ask for it – they may look elsewhere. This to a great extent explains why indivuduals go to sex workers in many societies, or plain and simple have an afffair.

This isn’t about South Asian couples per se. It’s about sex, relationships. The only distinction with South Asian cultures is this – cox we expect South Asian girls to be ‘pure’ , we tend to be more shy asking them to perform sexual fantasies – because the girl in question if she performs or conforms might be ‘judged’ in some way. I know, many straight Asian men who will openly admit to having sex transaction because they haven’t demanded the same within their relationships. Beyond this i don’t want to go into this too much – it’s shaky grounds for me, and i am not a women of the world as such – no pressure to conform to anyone’s standards, here but just haven’t got the bredth of experience

I am assuming men are therefore more physcial based on this – the fact that they can seperate the sex from the intimacy. I could be wrong here – but this will reflect my naivity in sexual relations and encounters- not a tendency to stereotype!

Perhaps, Sonia, quite a lot of us feel strongly about stereotypes, both on the right and the left.

Having said this, I don’t think it’s a stereotype to suggest men might be more physcial – without wanting to take things down to basics – men will always feel the need to masturbate, I am not sure it’s the same for women, though many women will. I hear that women find it less easy to have one night stands because they’re not as likely to seperate sex and intimacy – this is what i meant when i said men are more likely to be physical. Is this controversial? Shouldn’t be.

I think you’re taking this a little too seriously, but if we want to talk stereotypes , isn’t most of this thread, including, yours, mostly assuming sexuality is to do with straight couples – I’ve tried to qualify this heterosexual world view here without wanting to be boring , but there you go.

Bollywood probably picks blonde actresses rather than brunettes in order to emphasise the supposed racial difference between the desi hero and the ferengi (no not the Star Trek kind) gori heroine.

Good for Bollywood to be able to attract class-C blonde women in predictable cheesy movies. I guess once the audiences become fed up with blondes, we might see African women as heroines. I find them hot, so I can imagine a lot of Indians would do as well, instead of the same stereotyped faces in movies. But you are right, Jai, on that point. A lot of Bollywood actors and actresses could pass as Southern Europeans.

but more ordinary women still are dying their blonde..why who knows?!

In Finland and Germany, women paint their hair brown or black – as it is seen to be more attractive… or shall I say exotic?

yeah i agree bollywood probably want someone who sticks out – given the skin colour of the indian heroines is practically white anyway (compared to real ‘brown’ people on the streets) – they’d have to get a blonde in wouldn’t they..otherwise a brunette would just look..indian or something.

Re: #157

That was definitely true not so long ago but I’m not sure if that’s still the case. Otherwise Angelina Jolie wouldn’t be regarded as the most smoking hot woman in the known universe, for example.

Also, think about the popularity of Salma Hayek, Anne Hathaway, J-Lo etc etc.

Bollywood probably picks blonde actresses rather than brunettes in order to emphasise the supposed racial difference between the desi hero and the ferengi (no not the Star Trek kind) gori heroine. Having some dark brunette probably wouldn’t make the point so effectively, especially when you have Katrina Kaif, Kareena Kapoor, Diya Mirza etc, along with various actresses in all those soaps.

Are there any bollywood films where the inter racial relationship explored is b/n an asian actress and white blonde man?

Not as far as I know. Gurinder Chadha’s movies seem to have cornered the market on that sort of thing

As to other stereotyping in Bolly films I always laugh at the roles where a bad woman is always depicted as very western & commonly very assertive, with short hair, wearing western clothes (normally sleeveless tops & skirts) smoking & educated. As if these things & being ‘westernised’ is bad in itself

These days that’s actually much less common in Bollywood films than it used to be, although unfortunately it’s still prevalent in many Indian soaps, especially the saas-bahu variety a la Ekta Kapoor.

Are there any bollywood films where the inter racial relationship explored is b/n an asian actress and white blonde man?

As to other stereotyping in Bolly films I always laugh at the roles where a bad woman is always depicted as very western & commonly very assertive, with short hair, wearing western clothes (normally sleeveless tops & skirts) smoking & educated. As if these things & being ‘westernised’ is bad in itself – which does not help with the acceptance of inter racial relationships.

Studies showed we picked partners with the same hair/eye colour/same smell – especially if emotionally close to that opposite sexed parent.

Hmmm…..good point, but the twist for Indians is the fact that the majority (obviously not all) of Indians have black hair and dark brown eyes. Despite all those contact-lensed & dyed-haired actresses you see on certain saas-bahu serials…..So your chances of ending up with a partner who looks like your opposite-sex parent is obviously going to be a bit higher than, for example, it would be for many Europeans. At least in the case of people living within the subcontinent or Indians overseas who marry other Indians.

If you’re talking specifically about “mixed marriages”, then it would depend on whether it’s more common for desi guys to hook up with brunettes or mediterranean types rather than some nordic blonde Heidi Klum type.

Incidentally, as someone who probably watches more Bollywood films than is healthy, I’ve noticed that when depicting interracial relationships desi film-makers seem to deliberately cast conspicuously blonde white actresses far more frequently than the dark brunette type (eg. “Out of Control”, “Kisna”, “Rang de Basanti”, “Namastey London”, “Marigold”). Interesting. In fact, the only brunette actress I can recall is that Australian babe with Javed Jaffrey in “Salaam Namaste”.

Obviously all this is from a male-centric perspective, so I’ll let the ladies out there give the corresponding female point of view.

No, Prince Charles started off with a mistress. He acquired a wife to satisfy his obligations. Many of his predecessors did the same. If you believe in Prince Charles’s divinely-granted right to be king- and I think Prince Charles must to honestly accept his position- then you will accept the obligation to marry a virginal bride from the right sort of background.

Having girlfriends your parents may or may not approve of and then marrying a “nice girl” from “the right sort of background” as per your family obligations is actually a very Asian thing to do. Not very nice for all the young women involved, of course, and it’s definitely less common these days amongst British Indians (as usual, I can’t speak for the Pakistanis etc) as many parents are a lot more liberal than they used to be, but this sort of thing does happen.

Ultimately I guess it depends on how “homely”/conservative etc the guy’s mother is and how willing she is to accept some foxy minxy glamorous sex-kitten into the family Some aunties are more pragmatic and worldly than others.

Not that all this doesn’t also happen amongst non-Asians (including white people) too — we’ve all heard white people use the term “a girl you can take home to your mother”, for example — but perhaps some of the expectations and stereotypes are a bit stricter amongst some (not all) desi families.

spot on.

“Still valid point – but it’s mostly men that seem to need the extra mile, – perhaps this boils down to men being more physical creatures than women.”

it suggests [to me] that [you think] more men are acting on their frustrations than women.”

hence the points i made in my post. to me it sounded like you were repeating the commonly held stereotype that men are more physical creatures.

as far as i can see, it has been more socially acceptable for men to be physical, without their ‘honour/sanctity/respectability’ being brought into question.

which is a very big driver for social relations in the indian subcontinent (and also in victorian england) – men could have affairs much more openly, go to prostitutes etc. than women who had to do all their extra-marital activity in a much more concealed fashjion. hence again that’s why i mentioned ‘taking the indian subcontinent at face value’ – i meant that in ou- men can that’s why i commented on it. that was in our society, it is far more concealed -the matter of female extra-marital activity. that’s why i commented on it. that was my thinking…i.e. i din’t think its about whether men are more physical creatures or not, its about the social acceptability of the environment. it doesn’t really matter where the environment is, whether ‘india’ or ‘here’ there is still a widespread stereotype that men are more ‘physical’ than women. ( and i’m not sure where you’re going with the fetish thing..it doesn’t really matter to me ‘what kind of sexual activity’ we’re talking about – i’m not talking about that – i’m talking very generally about stereotypes held universally that men are more interested in sex than women.

It also mentioned a study on mixed race marriages – 67% of people with mixed race parents had a partner of the same ethnicity as their opposite sexed parent. THis pattern extended to second marriages.

But where he differed from his predecessors was that he also married his mistress. From what my rusty memory on history can recall I don’t believe any of his predecessors (when in reign) did marry their mistresses. The only one who did (ie Edward & Wallis Simpson) had to stand down as king.

And why did Charles do it? Because times have changed. He obviously got tired of filling his obligations & felt he had a right, as a private individual, to fulfill his real desires. So his obligation as a yet putative king only existed thus far. His private inclination superceded the collective/royal obligation.

“If you believe in Prince Charles’s divinely-granted right to be king – and I think Prince Charles must to honestly accept his position”

Following the logic through, the question is can Charles still honestly accept his position now? If we are to go by precedent then he too must decline the crown & follow in his uncle Edward’s footsteps.

Apologies if this is now is going off-post

See, love over physical urges. That is Bollywood for you…oops, I mean Hollywood

“Ravi, yes, take your point about public displays, but I am going to touch on very but I am going to touch on very , very shaky grounds here, isn’t it also the case that there many cases where perhaps you might still make room for extra-curricular affairs because wives/girlfriends didn’t go every where.”

This is necessarily not true. I have heard about a lot of stories of Desi people having affairs. Sure, they don’t flaunt it, and it’s not something that is brought up often in conversation, but this doesn’t mean that there have been LOTS of extra-marital affairs. Sex and infidelity exist and occur everywhere, but what differs is how people hide it due to social stigmas, and societal views on such behavior.