Though I was my friend Saman’s greatest defender in her wish not to marry; ironically I was possibly the last one to know that she had in fact tied the knot.

It’s not that I wished her a lifetime of loneliness but rather I understood that everyone should have the liberty to choose for themselves the course of their lives and she was not an exception. And if she wanted to stay single then that should be fine with everyone too.

And technically, it wasn’t that Saman was a man-hater or anything like that either. It’s just that she believed that marriage in a brown cultured society like ours limits a woman’s potential and restricts her role only to a wife and mother and nothing else. And even if a woman holds a full-time career that many in all reality do; it still means a sacrifice of her personal space and little or no support from others. And she wasn’t ready for such an unequal distribution of her life. She also wanted to give back to the community in so many ways and being “shackled” would prevent that from happening too.

So, when I found out that morning that she had indeed taken the huge leap of faith I was extremely surprised.

I was having my tea and toast when my cellphone bleeped. A WhatsApp from her.

I waited while the pictures downloaded.

“They must be some more of the ocean’s clean up. She’s been sending me pictures since she left,” I causally remarked to Fawad.

But when I began to look at the pictures I almost screamed. There she was in a simple white kameez shalwar and dupatta and sitting at what seemed like an Islamic Center getting married to this very handsome foreigner also dressed in shalwar kameez! OMG!

What is this?!

Fawad quickly asked me to pipe it down; his parents were still asleep.

“Fawad! It’s Saman! Look here! She’s getting married all Islamic style. Look!”

I couldn’t contain my excitement.

After the pictures she sent me a short message which said that she is married a foreigner who recently converted to Islam and she expected me to break the news to her parents.

I just sat there dumbfounded after reading the text.

Fawad was ready to go to work and got up and left me just sitting there.

I quickly messaged a congratulations and promised her that I would do what I could. I also promised that I would call her once I had fixed her issue to some extent.

But honestly, I had no idea how to fix this one bit. I kind of hated her for doing this to me but then she was my dearest friend who had helped me in times of need and I couldn’t let her down.

I called Auntie to ask if I could come over. She sounded worried. I think she thought I had some personal issue that needed her intervention. Oh how I was dreading this now.

Upon reaching their home, I sat down nervously while Auntie asked me how I was, etc.

After the initial pleasantries I built up my courage. I told her that I just had breakfast and asked her to just sit down with me when she offered me a drink or something to eat.

I could tell that she looked worried and I think by now she had construed all kinds of weird thoughts in her head about Saman. Maybe she thought something had happened to her which in all honesty it had.

“Auntie, you know how worried you are that Saman doesn’t want to get married, well there’s something I have to tell you.” Pause not for theatrical effect but to get my strength before I blurted, “Well, she met someone and got married in a small ceremony last week at the Islamic Center in Germany.” There I said it.

I added all the basic information to at least assuage her on some points of disapproval.

She sat there in a state of shock. I got up to the fridge and got her a glass of water. I poured out some for myself too. After a few seconds she asked, “Why didn’t she come home and tell us? We would have married her off ourselves properly.”

Now for part two of my revelation which I felt was harder to tackle.

I told her about George and I showed her the pictures. She seemed a mixture of mildly happy and tragically sad. She burst into tears a couple of times.

Then she turned to me, “Thank you, Saima for doing this for us. I know it must have been hard for you. But I’ll take care of it from here. I’ll talk to her. We’ll have a ceremony here too when she gets home and I will welcome George into our family. I know it won’t be easy for me. I mean, what will people say?”

I remained quiet. I really had spent all my energy in this process and there was really not more to add.

I forwarded Saman’s pictures and her message to Auntie and got up to leave. She hugged me tightly thanking me again for my help.

As I walked towards my car and even during the short ride to Ibrahim’s school my mind was racing. Brown parents want their children married at a certain age and on their own terms. These kinds of marriages, the kind that Saman had are hardly acceptable. Yet isn’t a marriage supposed to be a happy union and not one tied by social expectations? This is the reason why Saman didn’t want to get married in the first place and the reason why she finally did with a man she knew she would be happy with. Of course there will be issues like all marriages have but in the long run she will live her life on her own terms and enjoy true companionship; a thought that in most times is strange and almost impossible in a brown union, because these are unions of families and not really of two people.

I called Saman later in the evening and told her how it went down. Auntie had already spoken to her and things were okay between them. They were going to sort it out. I think however unexpected the wedding was, Saman’s mom was a tad relieved that she had indeed finally tied the knot; again typically brown of her to look at it from that perspective.