Arranged Scissors (11) in Japan

Read this article about the formalized Konkatsu process that has become a big hit in japan:

This year Japan has gone konkatsu-crazy, with the trend spawning countless magazine articles, a weekly TV drama and a best-selling book.

A Tokyo shrine now offers konkatsu prayer services, a Hokkaido baseball team has set up special seats for those looking for mates, and a Tokyo ward office arranges dating excursions to restaurants and aquariums.

A lingerie maker has even come up with a konkatsu bra with a ticking clock that can be stopped by inserting an engagement ring.

Japan – known for its strong work ethic that can squeeze social time, and for its declining birth rates – seems to be getting its mojo back.

Japan, like India, has had a “tradition” of arranged marriage. But in the last couple of generations, people have discovered louvvu, and because of the large number of louvvu marriaged, the arranged tradition seems to be getting lost. So the “elders”, matchmaking sites, the Japanese government, etc. have come up with this wonderful matchmaking concept.

Recently a friend of mine who is in the market told me that she planned to attend one such event in India. It was being arranged by some caste association, and one had to apply with triplicate copies of CV and passport size photos. A week before the event, one would get to inspect CVs from the opposite sex (no – this was before the court struck down 377) and make a tentative shortlist, and during the event there would be some sort of a speed-dating kind of mechanism.

Again a wonderful concept, and it is good to know these things have come to India also. But my friend wasn’t too impressed. The problem with the event, she said, was that it had been monopolized by parents of bride-seekers and groom-seekers who had come there representing their children. And because of this, potential brides and grooms had effectively been crowded out of this event, rendering it mostly useless.

That is the major problem with the marriage process in India. Parents assume they know too well about their kids, and appoint themselves as the bankers. I remember that after my latest case arenotted, my mom’s primary crib was that I had not appointed her as my lead banker for the deal. She was almost of the opinion that if she had been the banker, the case wouldn’t have arenotted.

It is a similar plague that has plagued the online matrimonial sites (links in the ad bar on the left) – too many of the users on these sites are people hunting for sons-in-law and daughters-in-law rather than those hunting for husbands or wives. Soon we may have the case of parents escorting their single twentysomething kids to bars in order to help them “pick up” people.

(konkatsu article via marginal revolution)

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