Love in the time of Internet

Last week I finished reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez's 'Love in the Time of Cholera'. It was easily one of the best woven stories I have ever read, the language delicately stimulated all the senses, something I rarely experience in a novel.

It wasn't just this that kept me riveted to the book all day and night for those 2 days. I even read about Fermina Daza and Dr.Urbino during my lectures, unfortunately giving people the impression that I was telepathically filtering in lecture content whilst reading a novel.

What caught my attention most in the story was inter-gender interaction and Love. The tale is set in times where the telegram was first starting to get popular, somewhere in the Caribbean.

A boy falls in love with a girl. This in itself is an understatement. I won't attempt to describe how he felt about this girl, but the mere thought of her tormented him for months. In order to make his intentions clear he has a number of obstacles and limitations to face. The only methods of communication available to him are either by directly speaking to her, or by letter which he has to deliver by hand or by proxy.

Speaking face to face was completely out of the question. The girl always had her Aunt by her side as a guardian. This meant no boy could approach the girl and harass her. Direct contact with potential spouses was frowned upon. He had to maintain his integrity.

He could've secretly delivered a letter to her of his intentions. This was risky, for if the girl was brought up to be a 'modest' and a girl of 'integrity' she would not accept a man who could exhibit such behaviour.

So the boy chooses to do it the legitimate way. After months of waiting for the opportune moment, he goes up to the girl and her guardian Aunt with a letter which took him uncountable number of hours to pen. He asks the girl in front of this guardian if she would grant him the permission of commencing a correspondence with her. The girl responds by saying she needs permission from her dad, and that when she gets that permission, he will know by an obvious sign.

It takes months of daily observation before that sign is made, and he proceeds to deliver the letter proclaiming his love. It takes her months to reply. This correspondence continues for four years without them actually meeting face to face. They are deeply in love with each other.

What struck me about this was how, each and every single step was crucial, significant and determinant of the history of their relationship. Each and every step had to be ratified by codes of honour, modesty and integrity. Each and every step meant something humongous. It took a good year before the boy first made contact with the girl. That whole year was spent in preparation for that one meeting. The girl spent that year waiting for him to make a move, observing him observing her from a distance. The Aunt spent that year as an independent adjudicator.

Each and every single letter delivered was crafted to perfection, and was received with starving eyes. The letters received would, after being read and re-read, be kept safe as talismans of their relationship.

Today we are not in the time of Cholera. We have been graced by the progress in communication.

Today a boy falls in love with a girl. This happens after meeting her at an event somewhere. He adds her on Facebook the next day and she accepts as anyone else would. In less than a week they are Wall-Walling like they were talking in real-time. The introduction of Facebook Chat makes communication even easier and private but it isn't good enough. In less than a month they are depleting their mobile phone contracts on each other and this has all happened without any expression of Love. It's all under the banner of friendship.

This continues for ages. The boy can't tell the girl he likes her because he believes she doesn't like him back and that she sees him only as a friend. The girl can't tell the boy that she likes him for the same reason, but also because this is frowned upon. The only obstacle to their mutual love...is their virtual, mutual friendship.

The guy one day has the guts to go for it and he proposes and they eventually elope.

This is Love in the Time of Internet. Gone are the sacred codes of integrity and modesty. Gone is the significance of each and every step taken in a relationship. A couple can reach the stage where they're on the phone to each other, and they won't even know how it reached that stage so quickly.

What once used to be an invisible wall between the genders has now been shattered. The barrier was constructed on the codes of integrity and modesty, and only with those two qualities could it be crossed. In today's world of Facebook, BBM and MSN Messenger that wall is gone.

The world has changed drastically, and with it the perceptions of modesty and integrity. It is now acceptable to speak to the opposite gender and form a relationship with them. My grievance is that this is being done with complete disregard to any definition of modesty and integrity.

I am talking about love here as opposed to friendship, which is an entirely different matter, although I still believe that in itself requires modesty.

All I wish for is that in the formation of a relationship between two people, that each step taken have great importance and meaning, unlike the meaningless fast-track that relationships seem to be taking these days. There is still room for modesty and integrity in modern communication.

Maybe, with them integrated, man will once more cherish his relationships.