Life before marriage never was partying and doing fun stuff for me. I did sometimes take a walk in town, go windowshopping with a friend, which was like going out for me. And before marriage, I saw two movies in a cinema. That's it. For the rest, I was always at home on my own with my books and tv, there was no internet when I was little. My parents did take me to the boring visits to other Pakistani families however and we did have family outings, but for the rest, it was school-home-school-home-school-home, etc.
I was told that after marriage life wouldn't change much, that it wouldn't bother me, also I was told that after marriage, I would have a nicer life. However, after marriage, I wasn't allowed to have contact with most friends anymore, I went even less outside than before marriage, not even windowshopping anymore with any friend, life after marriage was even worse than life before marriage. If the husband would have been kind and nice, if we could have had pleasant conversations and he wouldn't have forced me, I could have accepted that life nevertheless.
I think I was the only Paki with this kind of life. Because sometimes, when we visited other Pakis, their daughters all had many friends, they all visited even other Pakistani girls and I never did that, not even when growing up, in my town, we didn't have other Pakistanis, only some family with whom my mother had had a fight, so no contact there and the only Pakistani family in my neighbourhood, where I could have had friendship with their daughters, was also not allowed, because my mother had fought with their mother, for reasons unclear to me. Most of our Pakistani friends lived in a different town very nearby and some of them even went to school together. I was the only one who was always alone. Over the years, I did have a few Turkish and Dutch friends, but even with them, I often wasn't allowed much contact. And yet, life after marriage was even more isolated.
Now I actually feel more comfortable when I'm alone. I'm not much used to people anymore, for a short while, when I did have friends, I actually began enjoying it, until I discovered how vile people can be. Life is much better for me as it is.
