Re: 30 year old Pakistani women
one example does not mean anything. I can give you a number of examples where arrange marriage took place b/w two uneducated people and their sons and daughters became doc and engr.
ex. my uncle married someone from Pakistan. I can't remember her age at marriage, or if they have a major age difference, but she has a college education from Pakistan and used to be a montessary school teacher there. So we thought ok, mA, she's educated, and she should raise good kids because she is a teacher herself. She had two kids - one boy and one girl. The girl she taught how to cook and clean, and when that girl would sit down to do her homework she got minimal support from the mom. I ended up tutoring the girl to help her keep up, because her mom wouldn't do it, although her mom has a college education, you'd think she'd be able to help out with elementary and middle school level homework. When the girl got A's and brought them home, she was told she was probably cheating. So she lost motivation to excel at school. When she would be asked what she wants to do - she said doesn't matter, she'll get married. I asked where she got that idea from to get married and not go to college, and she said her mom. Her mom later completely denied this. Moreover, her mom's quality time spent with her daughter? Watching Pakistani dramas with her daughter - and not the intelligent ones, mind you, the ones that make you cringe. So she would get ideas from the dramas, that this is what a Pakistani girl's life ideally should be - marrying someone rich and then having drama with your in-laws. I tried explaining to the kid, who isn't much in the dept of looks, that she should look into colleges, keep her grades up, take advanced and AP classes so she can get scholarship money.
Now what? There were only 2 schools in the state that took her, and she has to pay tuition partially for both, so now the mom is paying 20K each year for her kid. If the mom had put more time and effort into her daughter's schooling and not have been discouraging when the kid came home with A's, I KNOW that kid could have made at least 3/4 scholarship somewhere and full scholarships at the state schools. I even tried sitting down with her to look for additional aide, but since I live elsewhere now it was hard for me to pin the girl down to get her to look for aide, and she hasn't even bothered - zero motivation. Now they're sending her to the community college for some basic courses so they don't need to pay the university, and they don't realize that's now going to hurt her in the long run, that she did part-time community and part-time university.
The SON on the other hand, he is encouraged highly into his education, NO ONE can bother him when he is studying, they make the sister help him on all his HW, and he's seen what his sister has gone through, so he's buckled down and doing much better comparatively. When he brings home anything from school - SHOWERED with praises, stuff gets put on the refrigerator, and he gets boasted about which boosts his ego, and he ends up doing even better the next day to get MORE praise. They want him to be a thorough professional go to college and grad school and do something good with his life.
And that for you ladies and gentleman, is what happens when you don't get to know a person before marrying them. :)
