By Ogova Ondego
Published February 2, 2021
As the rain pounded, beating the ground ferociously with ear-splitting thunder and eye-blinding lightning, Nyakoha was gripped with fear. She was about to marry a man she hardly knew. Her aunt had found a suitor for her. The wedding was going to be her second meeting with her husband-to-be. The first time had been three months earlier when she had been betrothed. Like many other women before her, Nyakoha did not know what to expect. But 41 years later, she is still married to the same man with whom she has 10 children. She has proved that marriage precedes love.
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Jane, 35, wonders where all the men who were once interested in her in her teens and early 20s have disappeared to. Have they all vanished from the streets or are they now married and settled down hence her not seeing them?
In today’s fast-paced world in which urbanisation has almost eliminated extended family ties, young people could be finding it difficult to get right marriage partners; that careers demand all their attention and energy exacerbate an already bad situation as these people hardly ever have time for relationships.
Putting in more than 10 hours a day, weekends find them exhausted and whatever relationship they may push in their crammed lives are usually low intensity ones. Unless one is careful, one may easily miss marriage altogether. Unlike Nyakoha and her husband who relied on extended family network to marry, today’s young people seem grossly disadvantaged.
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Wherever you go, it seems, people are complaining that there is a scarcity of marriageable men. Not only is blind dating is being recommended as a remedy for single people but various people are organising parties and meetings to bring single men and single women together in an attempt to help them find life partners. But this has mixed fortunes for various people.
Maria, a makeup artist who says she works between 10 and 16 hours a day, met her husband of four years on a blind date. With no man in her life at 35, Maria’s friends had advised her to join a club where she left her biographical details for any interested man to contact her.
Like her taunting relatives, Maria had come to believe that a woman who graduates from university and starts working without a man usually remains single for life; that at 30, a woman has a 20 per cent chance of marrying. At 35, Maria’s chance had already dwindled to 5 per cent and she was getting scared that it would dove-tail to 1.3 per cent before plunging to zero if she didn’t act fast.
It was thus with fear and trepidation that Maria’s friends approached Belinda, a woman described as an expert in blind dating, to help her get connected with a male friend. Within no time Maria had gone steady with her date, and they were married within a year.
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But blind dating is still not accepted by many people, especially men who not only view anyone who goes on a blind date with a stranger as having a psychological problem but also as a tool used by desperate women to trap them.
Is it any wonder that a recent blind date meeting at a hotel in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, had four women to every man who attended the Singles Party? Though the event had been widely publicized through flyers, posters, billboards, newspapers, radio, television and social media, it looked like men had given it a wide berth. Some observers noted that the men may have shunned the meeting because they may consider blind dating a foreign concept being shoved down the throats of Kenyans.
A 37-year-old woman who attended the function said she had tried to get a man to marry her but that no one seemed to be interested even when she offered to financially support anyone who would put a ring around her finger.
A beauty by any standard, she said she frequented clubs for singles and faithfully attended church where she sang in the choir and volunteered to do various tasks to increase her visibility but that still no man sho0wed any interest in her.
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Of late, some people have started seeking out partners through dating agencies, dating sites, Facebook and WhatsApp groups, magazine columns, church and self-help groups and friends. Still a few others who maintain contact with their folks in rural areas are still using relatives to match them with potential partners.
Like Nyakoha and her husband, people who meet on a blind date hardly know each other as the meeting is is aimed at helping them ‘discover’ their ‘missing rib’ in each other in the hope of marrying each other.
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Experts on relationships say blind dating is the best way for older women and men to meet in the hope of connecting with intelligent, funny, attractive, verbal, honest and hope-inspiring people to fall in love with, marry, and live happily ever after.
While the likes of Maria have met their mates through blind dating, others like Jane have been disappointed.
