I’m going to pierce my nose.

My dad tells me a story about the time his older sister was so fed up of doing all the chores in their household that she wanted nothing more than to get married just so she would be doing these chores for herself and her husband. This tells me two things: my father and his six brothers did nothing to help with the unequal distribution of labor in their household, and marriage is not an escape but another burden and yet some people still choose it.

Months later, when I tell him that I want to pierce my nose, he will say that piercings are a form of control and the tradition of piercing a body part and adorning it with jewelry is really the patriarchy at play. He and my mother will also tell me to get married any chance they get.

Both my mother and father grew up in traditional village families, and their upbringing has shaped who they are and what they fundamentally believe in. My upbringing as their child raised far away from home has shaped who I am and what I believe in, and those beliefs clash. Especially when the topic is centered around marriage and misogyny. It feels wrong saying that both of my parents hold misogynistic beliefs but it wouldn’t be a lie. Arranged marriages. Virginity. Chhaupadi, the practice of isolating menstruating women in huts. Unpaid and unacknowledged household labor. Women needing to eat after men. Looking at what they grew up with, it’s no wonder we don’t see eye to eye. Their idea of life (and the reality they have lived with for at least forty years) isn’t something I’m comfortable with, and as I grow older, the very thought of marriage disgusts me to my core.

Like every other South Asian™ parent that would have rather died than let their daughter interact with boys, mine had no shame bringing up the topic of men and marriage the moment I turned 20. My parents, who did not want me talking to guys. My parents, who did not want me to have a boyfriend (or even know what a boyfriend was for that matter). My parents, who did not want me to know what sex was, who could not even fathom the idea of my high school sending a pamphlet about free condoms as a part of a safe sex education campaign. My father, who once had a dream that me and my sister were friends with twin guys (we were and apparently ancestors like to snitch I guess). My mother, who sometimes likes to brag on the phone with her friends about how her daughters are “raised correctly”. Those parents. Those parents want me to get married.

It’s ridiculous, and almost every South Asian woman knows this feeling.

This hypocrisy is part of why I don’t believe in their version of marriages. Why I don’t listen to anyone deciding my timeline, telling me I should get married, or telling me what kind of person I should get married to. You can’t thrust a far-fetched idea on someone who doesn’t have experience, and they fail to realize that doing this is exactly what cuts off a person’s growth and autonomy. It’s exactly what I would tell women if I wanted them tied down before they could critically explore the world and learn how to criticize societal norms.

The difference between this notion they have that every woman should get married before she’s expired at 25, and getting a nose piercing is that one of those things is a choice I will make for myself. I’m going to pierce my nose, and adorn it with a dangly gold hoop.