Posted by This past weekend at my good friend Samira’s wedding, I was only one of 3 adult men who donned a traditional outfit whereas the rest of the men all wore Western suits. Every dawat, every formal deshi occasion, the men wear western clothing – pants, button-down shirts or sweater vests.
I’m not sure I understand this impulse to wearing Western clothing over our traditional clothing. Don’t get me wrong – I like western suits. I KNOW I look better in a suit than you and when I put on my fedora, don’t even bother coming to the ballpark because it’s already game over. But we celebrate just about every part of our traditional cultures yet don’t back it up in men’s attire.
Koorta/Punjabi/Sherwani – they’re actually easier to wear than a western suit with it’s pretentiously complicated matching tie and button-down shirt combo (ok it’s not so complicated to do a tie once you’ve practised 12-trillion times). Our women look good beyond belief in their salwar kameez or sari’s but there go the men trying to look like silly, untanned white folk. Obviously, the men won’t ever look as good in traditional clothing as the women but we should at least try to match civilisations.
Here’s a kicker – I’ve never heard a deshi girl (or non-deshi girl for that matter) say that she prefers the men to wear Western suits instead of the traditional gear.
