Catch 22

Image: http://theatre.harvard.edu

My brother, may G-d bless his righteous soul, analyzes my dating life when he gets bored.
Every now and then he will come up with a theory.
Today I heard one from him that I knew I would have to post on this blog.

Guys who date you are doomed from the start, he says.
If they go out with you and marry you, they are stuck with you forever (a.k.a imprisoned for life)
and if they do not want to marry you, they are doomed as well, because the whole world will know that they are are jerks via the blog.

The only solution the guy has is to kill himself.

Put that way, even I got sad. 

Out of Dating Practice

Image: http://www.datinggoddess.com

To all those poor people out there recovering from the post-Pesach haven't dated a guy/girl in two months trauma.
So you have a date and you just aren't in the swing of things anymore.

For girls:
Putting on make-up and blow drying your hair seems unnatural.
You cannot remember what your first-date outfit looks like.
You go on the date and you don't remember to smile every three minutes,
to ooh and aah at every stupid thing he tells you.
You can't remember the SIGNS. As in if he does this he means that, or if he says X he means Y.

For guys:
You do not remember that there is anything wrong with going on a date in flip flops.
You do not remember how to introduce yourself and start a conversation.
You do not know how to end a date.

To all those out there re-entering the stormy dating seas. One bit of advice:

WHATEVER YOU DO, DO NOT BE YOURSELF.

And good luck. 

The Shidduch World Becomes Science

Image: http://michaelgass.files.wordpress.com

As the world matures and more and more young talented minds are applying to PhD programs in psych, the realm of Shidduch dating is becoming an area of psychological research.
If you are single and Orthodox and would like to be a part of cutting-edge research, this survey is for you!

The letter is below:

Dear Study Participant,

My name is Deborah Mann and I am a doctoral student at Hofstra University currently working on my dissertation.   I am conducting a survey to better understand how current Modern Orthodox Jewish dating practices relate to mental health.  As a Modern Orthodox Jew, I find this area of research both interesting and important.  Your participation in this study will help us gain valuable insights into the mental health of this unique population (and help me complete earn my degree!). 

Please consider taking part in this study, and feel free to share it with any friends or family members who may be interested. Participants must identify as single Modern Orthodox Jews between 18 and 35 years of age to qualify. 

Your participation is voluntary and any information you submit will remain confidential.  All responses will be aggregated and individual responses will not be analyzed.  The survey should take no more than 20-25 minutes to complete, and it can be accessed via this link:  hofstrasurvey.  Please enter the password: hofstrasurvey to begin.   Completed pages will be saved for future access (from the same IP address) but please advance to the next page before closing the survey to ensure that the answers you have alerady provided have been recorded.   If you have any problems with the link, please contact me as soon as possible so that the issue can be resolved.

Upon completing the survey, you will have the opportunity to be entered into a raffle for an assortment of gift certificates to local merchants (also available to international participants) in the amounts of $10 (10 available), $25 (4 available) or $50 dollars (2 available)!   You can also opt out of this offer. 

If you have friends or relatives who are single, 18-35, and identify as part of the Modern Orthodox community, please consider inviting them to participate as well. You can do so by forwarding this e-mail or posting the survey link on Facebook or other social networking sites. Your help is hugely appreciated!

If you have any questions or concerns or if you would like additional information regarding this study or if you do not meet the necessary criteria but are interested in learning more about the results obtained from this survey, please contact the investigators, Deborah Mann, M.S., Doctoral Candidate at Hofstra University at datingandmentalhealth@gmail.com. You can also contact my supervisor, Sarah Novak, Ph.D. at Sarah.Novak@hofstra.edu.  

Thank you very much for your help and participation,

Deborah Mann, M.S.

When Your Ex Gets Married

Image: http://media.screened.com/uploads

What happens when someone you went out with: either seriously or not gets married. To someone else?
Do you expect to be invited? What are the feelings involved?

If you have dated more than one person, this will probably, maybe even hopefully for the sake of humanity and continuity happen to you.
Well, it is happening to me. And surprisingly, I feel nothing. Maybe because it was nothing serious, maybe because we parted on good terms and maintained a friendly relationship after we ended dating.
Maybe because somewhere I had the upper hand in making the decision and I knew it really was not my significant other. For a million of reasons maybe, and yet it gets me thinking.

I met the guys' father after his son got engaged. Oh and by the way, the father wanted me to marry his son, more than his son wanted it. I love it when people of the age of sixty and above fall in love with me. The day someone younger then forty will like me might be the beginning of a new era.
Anyhow, I wished him a hearty mazal tov. He winked at me and said: "Personally, you know what I would have preferred. But life had it differently."

I smiled. "Oh, sure I know what you mean! Maybe if your son would not have dated three other girls at the same time he was dating me, there would have been more to talk about." But seriously, great news, I wish him much hatzlacha in all his endeavors.

Lechaim

The Rebbetzins Club

Image: http://matzav.com/

YuConnects, SawYouAtSinai, GatewaysConnections, TouroConnects, Frumster and Jdate not working for you?
Do not despair
For the Rebbetzin's club is here!

http://www.rebbetzins.org/index.html

They will guide you through this challenging time and introduce you to Mr. Bashert.

Come on, everyone wants to be set up by a Rebetzin!

Shidduch Investigation at its Best



Image: http://static.howstuffworks.com/



Your Yiddishe Mama is not doing enough checking into potential shidduchim?

Have no worries. T.O.T. Private Investigators are here to do the bacground check for you.

And their slogan is Tuches Oifen Tish (Serving the Jewish Orthodox Community Worldwide).

http://www.totpi.com/shidduchim.htm

Good Luck.

Singles Paradise and Singles Hell

All It Takes Is One

Robert Goldblum

Managing Editor

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Image: 

http://www.symbolsbook.ru

With its size and sizzle, New York is a singles paradise. Here, grazing your shoulder on the packed 1 train; there, peering at you from behind a folded Times in line at the Angelika, a soul mate calls. Multiply that close encounter by — what? — a million. A gambler — or a single guy or gal — would take those odds.

With its eight million strangers and Hopper-esque shadows, New York is a singles hell. You can feel the loneliness here in your bones, like the wind off the Hudson. So many chances, so few connections. A short seller on Wall Street would take those odds.

Land of singles harvest. Land of singles drought.

Singles in New York live inside that cruel paradox. They walk arm and arm with it, a collar turned up to the cold and damp. They take it for coffee, to a Saturday matinee, to hear Elie Wiesel at the 92nd Street Y. All it takes is one, they remind themselves, knowing that hope is a muscle that you have to flex.

In the stories that follow about being Jewish and single in New York, we tried to steer clear of the sizable “business” of single life — online dating sites, matchmakers, outreach groups that plan mixers. We also did an end run around seeing the life of singles through a broad communal lens — the “shidduch” crisis in the Orthodox community, Jewish dating as a hedge against intermarriage.

Both approaches seemed demeaning to singles. Instead, we focus on human stories of singles living their lives in a society geared toward marrieds and families. We spoke to rabbis looking for love, who know that tending a flock — and tending a mate — is a skill no amount of theological training can prepare you for; and to young Orthodox divorcées dipping a foot in the dating pool, who know that to their suitors the baggage of their sweet children might simply be too much to bear. We spoke to single moms by choice whose searches for fathers for their children, and husbands for themselves, are too often heartbreaking; and to singles of a certain age who cherish their independence but fear a long life alone, one that stretches before them like an empty highway.

We tried to have fun, too. We identified some cool places to go on a first date, and surveyed the comic/serious road traveled by four women playwrights courageous enough to turn their own dating misadventures into Off-Broadway works. And we tried to bust the myth that the Promised Land of the Upper West Side is the only place for Jewish singles. There is Jewish life for singles east (and west) of Eden, after all.

When the “speed dating for kohens” session (seriously, there was such an event in November) has ended, when the mixer on the shul roof has wound down, when the matchmaker has dispensed her sage advice, too many singles head home to sleep single in a double bed, to quote a classic lyric from Nashville. It’s rough out there, singles tell us. And sure, there are singles who live very full, very contented lives, the search for a mate taking a back seat to other pursuits. But they seem to be in the minority. For the others, sometimes they must feel like George and Lennie, the two drifters in a world of searing loneliness in Steinbeck’s California. “Guys like us,” George says, “they ain’t got nobody in the worl’ who gives a hoot in hell about ‘em.”

More than making pronouncements about a crisis in our midst, the Jewish community needs to make singles feel as if they aren’t simply drifters here, that they have a seat at the communal table, that we all give a hoot in hell about them. Beyond that, there’s the hard-won lesson that singles know all too well — that hope is a muscle, and all it takes is one.

Meet Pray Love--Shidduchim and the Government

• Published 03:12 09.12.10
• Latest update 03:12 09.12.10

Meet, pray, love ... eventually

Lawmakers discuss later marriages among national religious camp.

By Jonathan Lis

In a city like Jerusalem, it's not easy to be a religious male who stays single past
his early 20s. His parents fret; matchmakers lose their patience; and worshippers
 in synagogues give him pointed looks. Katamon and Nahlaot, two neighborhoods
 filled with Orthodox singles, constitute the "big swamp" and the "little swamp."

Together with a desire to see the world, priorities for thousands of young single
religious men and women have changed - they are not in a hurry to start a family.
 Television channels in Israel have stopped ignoring this trend, and have devoted
to it special programs, like Yes' hit series "Srugim."

A meeting of the Habayit Hayehudi party this week in the Knesset reflected the
 trend, and the challenges it poses.

Slowly, religious singles filed into a small room, and tried to explain to the
 Knesset representatives why they aren't finding partners and getting married.

The MKs tried to figure out how they can reduce this growing trend in the
Orthodox community. Minister Daniel Hershkowitz got married at the age of 19.
 MK Zevulun Orlev was married at the age of 24, whereas former MK Nissan
Slomiansky waited to the ripe age of 26.

The trio tried to determine what is causing young people in their community
to pass the age of 30 without a beloved, though in the end they admitted a
quick-fix could not necessarily be found.

Orlev told the participants that while he married young, he has familiarity with
the phenomenon from his own family. "I have a son who got married at the
age of 30, and that seemed excessive to us. On the family level, it causes
pressure. I assume that single men and women feel this pressure, but the
 fact is that they stand up to it, because they get married very, very late.
 This is a trend which must be discussed."

Chaim Falk, chairman of Yashfe, a non profit for singles in the national
 religious community, said that his empirical investigations have yielded "truly alarming numbers."

"Being single is much more prevalent among males than females," he said.

In the national religious community today, he estimated, there are 31,000 unmarried males and 21,000 single women between the ages of 25-40.

Participants in the meeting cited a number of factors keeping the chuppah canopy folded away. First, marriage age is rising generally around the world, and so follows the national religious as they are exposed to Western culture. Second, whereas in the past Orthodox women married on average at the age of 19, today many are free to get married only at the age of 23, after they complete first degree studies. Males at that age are just finishing their army service or yeshiva studies; and such differences in their stations of life creates gaps.

This story is by:
• Jonathan Lis

Shidduchim and Midrashim

Below is a video which is an accurate and too funny but unfortunately true about Shidduchim.  

It isn't for no reason that the Gemara states that G-d has as difficult a time making Shidduchim as splitting the red sea. 

Below are two more funny videos made in the same style about varying views and approaches to Midrashei Chazal:

Yeshiva Guy Gives Vort

The Slifkin Debate

Waiting for the Phone to Ring

Image:  http://www.engageselling.com/

To borrow a quote from some stupid movie: Waiting for the phone to ring is like waiting for rain in the desert. 

Woman extended power over man by influencing him to eat from the tree of wisdom, and in response 

G-d cursed her with the scary words of Vehu Yimshol Bach, and he shall control you.

And we, poor women, for countless generations have been suffering from that terrible curse. 

And, although true, the curse is much less prevalent today than it was in the past few centuries, the curse manifests itself in waiting for that call. 

That unwritten rule, of you can't call, he has to call, and if you dare call him before a date, all hell will break loose and you will be put in a mental asylum until the end of days. 

I spent too much of my life waiting for the phone to ring and I propose a revolution. Perhaps a reform. I am not such a fan of drastic change with blood and tears. 

I do not know if my nervous system can handle that. 

On that note, it is almost Chanukah.... and there are two adorable videos of Yiddishized Pop produced by friends of mine: ENJOY!

The Race To The Canopy

Image:  http://farm5.static.flickr.com

Mazal Tov. My friend. From Seminary. Got Engaged.
I heard the news and I should have felt happy. But I didn't.
I wasn't sure if the reason I felt no clear sense of joy was because I thought I was extremely close with her and did not even know she was going out with someone seriously. Perhaps I should have given her the benefit of the doubt. She went on five dates before getting engaged. She did try calling me once last week. I was at work and could not pick up. Perhaps I should not judge so harshly. Why was I not happy for her?
I wished her a Mazal Tov. I said the right words. My heart was not in it though.

I thought about my friend, about seminary, about the larger issue that her engagement entailed that I was not willing to admit to myself existed.
The fact is, that out of my five closest seminary friends, as of tonight I am the only one who is not with a baby, not with a husband, and not even with a Chatan.
I am the last single girl of the clan. And the irony of it all is, that I am but only TWENTY years old.

Officially, we all wish each other the right one at the right time. Officially, each person does what is right for him or herself. Officially, no one takes into account other peoples statuses when making important decisions in life. But that is all officially.

In reality, however, there is this mad race destined to the canopy. And whoever gets to that Chuppah first scores.

I understand that I chose a different path in life. I shifted my focus to academics and career, not as  a replacement for marriage and family, but as a process of self enrichment and achievement. It is natural that I would take longer to find a spouse, natural for me to be less desperate.

And yet, there is still that slight pang, that voice in the back of my head that I thought I buried forever, that whispers in a voice ever so annoying, you are the last single girl on earth.

Getting What You Want—A Different Perspective on Shidduchim

Image: http://www.jewcy.com/files

A difficulty I have with Shadchanus is the fact that it makes me feel like a beggar. As if I am some desperate girl passing out from the disease of singlehood and begging on one knee for a spouse. It is easier to fundraise or to ask for help when it comes to others, it does not make you feel selfish. Aside from that Shidduchim also kill any sense of self respect that a person has for themselves. It is so demeaning to go to a person and have them ‘fix you up’ with someone as if you were broken. Enough people should know me to suggest someone appropriate.

Besides, meeting someone on your own is more romantic, usually has a nice story, and there is the advantage of having enough time to get to know a person better before stepping into the marriage track of dating.

A broken engagement and several months later I can confidently say that I have had a paradigm shift on Shidduchim. I no longer refuse to hear the word Shadchan, I actually pursue Shadchanim myself sometimes. It might appear extremely right wing to you. I will do my best to explain my view and beliefs on the matter. I want to hear what your opinion is on the matter.

Don’t throw stones at me, but I view marriage as pretty much any deal that I would like to secure. The parallel that I keep on thinking of is real estate and the Shadchan as the real estate agent. No, I am not saying that a guy is an apartment or a house, but there are definitely similarities.

If my guy-friends are not people I am interested in potentially marrying, then waiting around for my guy to show up on the white horse is not really working.

So now looking for a husband is on my to-do list similarly to pursuing my education, choosing my career path, and figuring out where I want to live. And I am taking active measures to find what I want in marriage just as in any other area of my life.

I know what I am looking for in a guy, I pretty much made a list of the qualities I am not willing to compromise on, qualities that I would prefer, and qualities that are a no-no for me. Once I understood what I wanted, I started telling people to keep me in mind. I might be extreme, but I remember sitting at a Shabbat table. There were many people sitting there and everyone took their turn introducing themselves with a name and a brief description. I smiled and said: Hi, my name is Tania, I am single and searching. People laughed.

When I meet people who know many guys I tell them what I am looking for in a guy and tell them to keep me in mind.

My prerogative is to get as many great young men as I can to choose my spouse from. Therefore, I try to reach as many sources as I can.

My brother once called a Shadchan, the Shadchan suggested a guy who had previously rejected me. Instead of saying that the guy said no, my brother said: “He is a bit harsh; my sister is looking for someone with a sweeter personality.” I loved the way my brother twisted it. It was not about the guy, it was about me, and about what I am looking for.

The person who is in Shidduchim is the consumer. And there are consumer rights which can and should be used to provide the consumer with his or her needs.

Oxymoron: Professional Shadchan

Image: http://www.exceler8ion.com/

I was talking to a friend about Shadchanim. We started talking about a certain one and then my friend said. I love her; she is such a professional Shadchan.

I was startled there for a bit. What do you mean professional?

I was raised with the understanding that people are considered professionals when they do not mix business with personal lives. The business of a Shadchan is PERSONAL life. How professional is it to know exactly what one finds attractive, what one is looking for in a spouse, how one reacts when having to wait for a phone call three entire hours, how many kids one wants to have (however many Hashem gives of course), what one thinks of family, financial ideas, and how one likes to spend their free time.

On that note, Shadchanim, when good, can make the job of shopping for a spouse less awkward by keeping relevant information to themselves, by returning phone calls, and by not dismissing every issue that comes up as ‘ridiculous’.

My brother asked me if I knew how many Shadchanim it took to change a light bulb. I said that I did not. He said: “Why? What is wrong with this light bulb? It does not need to be changed.”

When I just did not get it

Picture (http://www.dumpeddays.com/wp-images/Getting-Dumped-Lessons-Learned-From-The-Men.jpg)

Relating the experience of a friend in dating (with her permission)

This happened to me when I was still a freshman to the world of dating and I thought in my naiveté that the first guy I date will be my bashert and happiness would start then and there.

I met this guy, let us call him Yaakov. He was okay: pretty smart, decent looks, came from a nice family, he made a joke that made me laugh once in awhile. I forgot to mention the fact that he was nine years older than me. 

Our first date was a tofu date, i.e. it was pareve. I dressed up in the best of my clothes, stood in front of the mirror applying make-up for a good thirty minutes. I straightened my hair until smoke sizzled from my head. I turned off the hair iron for fear of putting off the fire alarm, I wore shoes that I could not really walk in, but they made me feel and look really feminine (wink wink). 

Yaakov picked me up and took me to the mall. Parking near Home Depot, he decided to walk into the store, hoping to access entrance to the larger mall from there. Little did he know that Home Depot is the only store in the entire mall with no entrance to the mall. We spent the first forty minutes walking around that store looking at floor tiles, shower curtains and toilet seats. Needless to say, I felt ridiculous and out of place. I should have been wearing a t-shirt and a denim skirt for such a lovely outing. When we passed a display of carpets, Yaakov asked me what color carpeting my dorm room had. I looked up at the metal tubes in the ceiling and let out a silent cry. "Get me out of here!" I begged noiselessly, "Is this what dating really is??? It is awful." As if picking up on my discomfort, he suggested we leave the store and find another way to enter the mall. What a brilliant young man… Took him only three quarters of an hour to come to his senses. 

The thing is, e wasn't a bad guy, so although the date was mediocre, I agreed to go out again, because I was told that everyone needs a second chance and one date just is not enough.

We went out again, I had a nice time. After the date, Yaakov suggested that we drop the Shadchan. I loved the fact that he was so blunt, and mistakenly thought that he wants to "get serious" with me. I was so flattered that I failed to see anything negative.

After we went out for the third time, I thought that things were getting really serious and I really should not go out with him anymore if we do not go through genetic testing, Dor Yeshorim. I told myself that I would enquire after our next date.

Our next date was okay. We walked around town. There was a slight drizzle. Besides for the fact that I was hungry and tired, I had a pleasant time.

 I am a person that is terrible with directions. After walking for about two hours, I told Yaakov that I am ready to go back. He didn't remember where he left his car, so we started walking around New York City, looking for his car, which looked identical at least to every other car I saw. So we were walking… and walking… and it started raining, and my hair started frizzing, and my feet were hurting, and I was still tired, and still hungry, and we were still walking. Finally, I found the street where Yaakov had parked the car. I was so proud of myself. So we stand by the car and we have this pleasant conversation, and I am waiting for this idiot to open the car because it is raining and I want to go home already!!!! After about twenty minutes of standing there, Yaakov says: "Just by the way, in case you were wandering, this is not my car." I was so embarrassed for judging him prematurely, and he didn't want to make me feel bad so he just didn't move for twenty minutes. I laughed out of helplessness.

Finally, we found the actual car and Yaakov drove me home. As we were approaching the destination, I asked Yaakov to pull over because I wanted to discuss something with him. I was trying to make the genetic question seem as natural as possible. Sensing my discomfort, the so sensitive Yaakov said: "If you do not want to go out with me again, I understand completely." I wanted him to know that that wasn't the case, so I said: "No, Yaakov, I would love to go out again. It is just that, well, I think we should do Dor Yeshorim."

He shifted in his seat. 

--I like you. A lot--he said

"Oh, great," I thought to myself, "so he will do Dor Yeshorim and all will be dandy."

--But-he continued-- I do not think we should go out anymore.

WHAT! I was in shock. He was dumping me. I was getting dumped. So this is what it feels like. He went on to give me advice on how I should date guys and reject everyone I meet and how I am still a great person, and how he knows the market out there, and he isn't nervous for me (well, duh! he is dumping me. Obviously, he isn't nervous for me. All I could think of was the fact that I couldn't read him at all. He gave me the opportunity to say no and I missed it.

I was devastated by the break-up. 

What fascinated me was that everyone I spoke to about this dating experience, perceived it through their own personal dating experiences. 

I called one close friend who married the first girl he ever dated as soon as it was over and burst into tears.

--It's over--I said

--What do you mean, it's over? How could it be over.

I thought of him in fascination. Wow, a person who cannot understand a relationship that does not work out.

I spoke to another friend (also a guy) who rejected every single girl he went out with.

--How are you?--he asked?

--It's over--I said

--Who ended it?

--He did.

--Well, you know--he said,--- it must be very difficult for him to end it, it can't be easy for him. 

All I could do was laugh, because I really did not have it in me to feel bad for this guy who dumped me in such disgrace.

I spoke with my friend who is extremely analytical. She wanted to be my teacher.

"It's over," she said, "well, maybe take his advice to heart. Maybe you just aren't ready." HELLO. Are you my friend or his??? 

Finally, my best friend, who I could rely on for anything ran over to me as soon as she found out about it, threw her hands around me, and called the guy every evil name that was ever muttered under the sun and told me that I would find the absolute best guy for me in the right time.

With time, I started doing the same thing to friends of mine. When people are dumped, they don't want to be questioned. They don't want to be criticized. They want to be loved.

Why the Shidduch scene is called a market

picture (https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgd3vmHsmZQCdRXbgh5R62NVTse3m2HbM_6SC9PdxyvXoLDzxWZnB_eQzge8_49vETA0SAYLLnGEs58PLXA9zcxzcuIwPvU849RcNb8I2mCBrFO89Sxkoss_NWxnQn8F3WWsYwRkpc21UM/s400/blind_date02.png)





There is a market out there with products for sale, customers and salesmen. The sales proceed smoothly in the case that all roles are acted out properly.

Product for Sale: Girl

Salesman: Shadchan

Customer: Young man

America is the land of consumers market. It is not communist, and therefore, there must be a surplus of products for customers to choose from. That is why for each guy out there, twenty girls are lined up waiting to kiss the heels of his feet.

Products vary. Girls can be chosen dependent on their height, weight, family background, eye and hair color, intellect and qualities.

The job of the salesman is to find the young man the product his choice, i.e. his bashert. The business works like real estate, where the Shadchan gets paid on commission, every time he/she scores an engagement.

Now every young man is looking for the perfect young lady: smart, beautiful, kind, great family, lots of money….

The difficulty of the Shadchan is that the products the customers want do not exist, because girls, although they are products, are imperfect, for they are manufactured by G-d. So the Shadchan has the challenging task of convincing a guy to go out with someone who is not exactly ‘his perfect girl’.

Once the Shadchan does coerce a guy into going out with a girl because although she is 5’1, she is extremely sweet, and although she isn’t the nobel prize winner, she is definitely smart enough (to cook cholent….), and she has the looks of an amazing person (whatever that means), and her parents live extremely comfortably (in a condo with a dog), the guy agrees to go on a date, but only one date.

Then, please keep in mind, that the shidduch markets is one of the only ones selling human beings, so the Shadchan goes to the product, i.e. the girl and tells her that she must give this guy a try, because he is just one in a million.
Although the girl has been sitting by her phone for the past eighteen years, reciting tehillim, waiting for that fateful call from the Shadchan, she doesn’t want to sound too excited for the fear of Chas Veshalom sounding desperate. So she asks the Shadchan about him:

(please keep in mind that brackets include thoughts only)


--Is he smart?
--He has a great head (for a hat rack)
--Does he learn?
--He has a great head
--I understand, but does he set time to learn?
--As I told you already, he has a great head.

--Is he tall?
--I would definitely say he is taller than you (I think he reaches 5’2 with his hat on. What does she want already, for me to set her up with someone who isn’t Jewish?)
--Is he good looking?
--{Super Enthusiastic Voice} He looks extremely manly! (i.e. he is really fat, and has hair coming out from between his first and second shirt button, and hair in his nose and ears)
--Is he neat?
--Well, I was never in his room, how do you want me to know that? (Basically, he is a pig)

--Is he nice?
--He gives off a very nice impression (for the five minutes that I saw him)

--Does he have plans for supporting a family?
--You know what darling {in an irritated voice}, details you will just have to find out for yourself!


The girl is perplexed, but this definitely sounds like an amazing guy, so she agrees to go out.

The guy is so nervous before the date. The palms of his hand are covered in a cold sweat as he keeps undoing and redoing his first button, trying to understand if he should look official or cool, not that the button will really help “nerd” within him go away. He arrives by her front door ten minutes early, but since guys can’t be early, he drives around her block thirty three times and finally pulls over fifteen minutes too late.
He knocks on the door. Every minute seems like eternity. Finally, he hears footsteps. The door opens and there stands a gorgeous young girl. Young man is mesmerized.

--You are here to see my sister?—she smiles.
The young man can only nod. He has no idea what to say.
He looks toward the dining room where his date awaits him. With every ounce of strength that is left in his body, he keeps the smile pasted on his face, silently cursing himself out for not running in the other direction when the Shadchan told him that the girl he was going to date looked “healthy”, she only weighs about three hundred pounds. And her nose is just from shir hashirim, as it resembles the Babylonian tower protruding gracefully from between the girls’ eyes.

They leave the house and start talking. Life is not that bad after all and the two have a pleasant conversation. The girl is extremely spiritual, so she can look past his ugly ‘manly’ looks and appreciate his inner qualities, while the young man, well, he is still a man, and he just doesn’t feel the chemistry, and it is not because he forgot to bring a formula from the lab. So after the date, he waits twelve hours, because, after all, who calls the Shadchan immediately? It’s not like he was thinking of her or anything.

--Hi, Mrs. Shadchan, thanks for setting us up, but the girl is not for me.
--Why not? I had such a good feeling.
--Well, she was not wearing any make-up
--You know what, it’s extremely important to know a girl the way she is, without any external distractions.
--No, and she was not really my type
--But why? She is exactly what you are looking for. You think you are looking for one thing, I am telling you, what you really need for happiness in life is to marry this girl.
--Thank you, but no, although she is a wonderful person.
--And that is why I think you should go out again!
--Mrs. Shadchan. Thank you, she is not for me.
--Well, it’s your loss.


The Shadchan calls the girl with a heavy heart and informs her that it’s over. The girl breaks down in sobs because her entire future is now ruined and the man of her dreams refused to love her in response. She begs the Shadchan to tell her what she did wrong, what she should change, to no avail. The young man does not want to go out with her anymore.

That’s the saga of the shidduch date and why the shidduch scene is actually a market.