by Wais Hassan.

There have been numerous articles written recently about online dating and courtship but I have not seen many from the Muslim perspective. Actually, there are a number of Muslim dating sites that have popped up during the past few years and some of them are pretty well designed and have thousands of registered users. I, an Afghan American 1st generation graduate student, have joined a couple of these sites during the past few years.

It is so difficult to meet and become friends with Muslim women in my everyday life because there are so many expectations the culture places on both men and women. Women do not want to be perceived as being loose or immoral and many who date will never admit to actually be dating anyone. All Muslim parents I know frown on casual dating and most of my relatives agreed to arranged marriages when they decided they were ready to settle down.

Some of these marriages did not turn out very well (Muslims do not divorce at a very high rate but it is obvious that some of their marriages are loveless). So I decided to join this website called afghanpersonals.com partly because I am skeptical about arranged marriages and partly because it is so difficult to socialize with afghan women in day to day settings. Sure, I have met some I have been attracted to while going to college but never had a close friendship with them. I figured the website could be a convenient way to talk to afghan women without worrying about the prying eyes of their parents, siblings and girlfriends.

Since then I have become pretty addicted to the site and have sent many messages through it. A few months ago I had an interesting adventure through it. I was searching for women who lived near by and came across a profile that caught my eye. The profile stated that this woman wanted to play matchmaker for one of her afghan friends. She wrote that her friend was sweet, beautiful, innocent and smart. Of course, I was interested so I emailed the matchmaker my info and a pic. She responded that she was impressed by my profile and informed me that her single friend was not aware of this website and did not know that she was playing matchmaker.

She said that she could not tell her friend about the website or what she was trying to do because she was afraid of her friend’s possible angry reaction. But said she would tell me where her friend worked so I could approach her friend, do a little flirting and perhaps get her phone number. I informed the matchmaker that I would contact her friend but would not mention her in any way.

So I left for her work on a Friday morning (drove for forty minutes before getting there, hey, I am pretty desperate) and showed up at the Macy’s counter where she worked. I had no pictures of her before showing up but I can always spot an Afghan woman from a distance. I decided to buy some cologne even though I never usually buy it in order to get a chance to speak to her. But unfortunately she did not wait on me and ended up being served by a co-worker.

I left disappointed but wasn’t sure if I should leave or wait until she had lunch and possibly accost her if she opted to get lunch at the mall food court. But then I thought it would be too forward an action for a Muslim woman so I decided to go home and contact the matchmaker. (I only had the matchmaker’s email address, not her real name or her phone number.)

Well, the matchmaker took pity on me and decided to release her friend’s phone number. So I called her out of the blue. I got her answering machine so I just rambled a message across. I said, “Hi, my name is Wais, I got your number from your friend, met your friend online on the afghanpersonals website and I went down to your work last week to talk to you. I didn’t get a chance to talk to you, but I did see you and loved what I saw! Your friend said you were also smart and innocent. I would love to talk to you later, this is my cell phone number, call me. Khuda hafiz (good bye in Persian).

In retrospect, I should have been more tactful because she is a Muslim woman, after all, and probably a virgin. She did call me back a few weeks later, scolded me on how I talk, told me I was a street person, and tried to pump me for information. She wanted to know the identity of the matchmaker. I told her what I knew but she was not able to piece together the identity as far as I know. Since then I have texted her and called her a few occasions and apologized but she has been completely unresponsive. The first impression is always the most important in the Islamic world and unfortunately both men and women tend to judge each other before actually knowing the other person. But who knows, maybe more Muslim men and women will join free sites like this one and adjust their expectations after gaining experience dating people outside the religion.

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