That is What She Said,Check Please

As soon as these words are uttered and his index finger and thumb emulate him holding a pen and he makes that zig zag in the air, looking straight at the waiter, she reaches out for her handbag. She rummages through it and because it belongs to a woman, it is home to her world. She smiles coyly but her mind is in a twisted fix. “Does he expect me to go Dutch? Will he offer to foot this? Should I offer?”

These are few moments of a strange kind of emo-financial anxiety and before I started penning this particular piece down, I was in one too. Different women look at this ‘who pays’ scenario very differently. Many of you may not even think this is worth an entire column, but believe me, it is. If a woman has, at any point, been asked or has dropped the ‘who paid?” question to one of her girlfriends post a date, it just means it matters. Period.

I came home a little post midnight. The alley laden with cobble stones leading to my apartment now looked clean and shone under the moonlight. I stared at them while chewing copious amounts of mint to disguise the smells that would betray my whereabouts. Pee’s parents were home so the least one can do is pretend that parents never had a youth and could never tell how you like your whiskey just by your breath.

As I entered the house, Pee distracted the parents, snuck me to my room and demanded details of the evening. “What do you want me to say? You know how it is with S, he’s still as smart, handsome and so intense. And as always, I’m blown away.” Pee didn’t look satisfied with any of my fawning and admiration. The true blue Sindhi in her had only one question, “So who paid?” I looked sheepish, and tried steering the conversation in a more frivolous direction. While I took my earrings off, I looked at Pee as she told me very honestly that a 33 -year -old successful man with 8 years of fat corporate paychecks had no business goingDutch with a woman, that too at one of those cheap alcohol bars in Mumbai. It’s just not done.

Whether I’d like to admit or not, no matter how appealing he was, I would have to whole-heartedly agree with Pee. We’re no longer in college where dating meant a huge dent in monthly pocket money and the painfully compelling arguments with parents as to where all their hard earned cash was spent. Going Dutch is not morally incorrect or it’s not like you’re mocking the woman. It’s just ungentlemanly. And believe me; impeccable manners are always a turn on. Women who feel otherwise have more or less resigned to their fate of being surrounded by creeps, who one can find in abundance in this country, and those like me are adamant to never settle for anyone below the standards of a thorough gentleman.

I think Savitri Bai Phule ruined it for all of us. While we were happy fulfilling our bedroom-kitchen responsibilities, there she stormed in, this firebrand revolutionary, vehemently professing alien concepts of gender equality and education for the girl child. Little did she know that this would confuse the living daylights out of an already messed up Indian social structure. So, now that girls are independent and more economically confident, now what? Does our need for equality absolutely negate our innate need to feel protected? Do we not have the right to expect our men to pull out chairs, open doors and take the check just because we now rake in the bucks? I think not. We’re still women and, therefore, still suckers for chivalry.

I would also like to make very lucid the fact that it’s not about taking the lady concerned to a fancy place. It’s not about spoiling her with a place that raises the bar so high that she can’t expect anything less while you can’t expect to pay your rent. I’ve always maintained that we live in a confused nation, where the gender power play is still in its very nascent stages. Women may make as much money as you do, she may be able to afford all that you can, her career may be as important to her as yours is to you, but this goes beyond anything materialistic, because before a woman, she is a lady. And she wants to be treated like one.

On the other hand, when I did talk to men about this, it was very simple. One of them said, “Listen, I’ve been on dates where, when I’ve paid, the chick thinks there’s something on.” This is a valid fear though I do think it’s a tad bit delusional. Paying for a woman has nothing to do with romantic predilection. If that were the case then we’d all be taking our dormant Electra complexes very seriously. I remember an old friend of mine in Delhi who went out for a movie with a man who had one of the most glamorous jobs in the country which required him to live, yes live, in the Rashtrapati Bhavan. He toured with the President and lived like royalty. But when he took my friend out for a movie and took his share of ticket money from her, it just left all of us completely dumbfounded and then disgusted. Needless to say, she never saw him again.

There are women who’d like a man to be subservient, there are women like me who’re into men who love opinionated women, there are women who might like the alpha male and those who might like them metro-side-up. But the one thing that binds us all is the undeniable love for a man who knows how to treat a woman, let alone love her. That’s not much to ask for.

So, be a man and take the check. If she’s just a friend, you’ve won her respect and if she’s a bit more, then congratulations, you’ve moved an inch closer to winning her heart.

Shahana Nair Joshi is just fabulous. She’s a journalist, so she tries very hard to be the woman on top. In reality, she just likes to bum around and eat chocolate.