r/ABCDesis

The weekly relationship thread for all topics related to the bravest pursuit of all - love. This thread will be automatically posted every Sunday @ 5:00 A.M (UTC -5). All other dating or relationship based posts during the week will be removed and redirected to this thread.

This thread is a place to share your stories, ask for advice, or vent about issues. Or anything in between!

Disclaimer: long, analytical post.

First off, ask your parents or grandparents to name a single cricket player before 1983. I bet you'll hear crickets. Why? Because it was only after that World Cup win that India's cricket fever began. And only where fever exists is it possible for investment, national support, and dominance to exist.

Just think about it.

Do you really think a wartorn nation like Haiti is investing in youth sporting development? Or corrupt wastelands like Senegal? India is far far more functional than both. We're just not obsessed about football. When you walk through the slums, you see kids using makeshift bottle-bats and scrunched up paper-balls, not footballs.

So how do you change that?

Just adapt the 1983 playbook for the realities of modern-day football.

Engineer a national success privately and let the sport become a fever publicly.

The best part is that it's already been done. We just need to adapt it.

In 1999, Tom Vernon, Manchester United's head scout in Africa, started a makeshift academy training 16 young African boys out of his home. More charity than anything else. And in 2004, they began partnering with boarding schools in the US to get talented kids athletic scholarships.

Fast forward 10 years and the academy ended up getting ranked as one of the best football youth academies in the world and buying a club in Denmark's top league (with a bit of corporate charity). Now, in it's 20-somethingeth year Right to Dream academy has graduated several Premier League (EPL) players and operates professional clubs in Denmark, Egypt, and soon Major League Soccer (MLS).

Here's the model -- run cheap, large-scale tournaments all across West Africa (something like 100k kids participate in total per year) and mine the pool for the 15-20 that are worth developing rigorously. Fund their entire lives / training / education until they turn 18 and then transfer/relocate the most talented ones to your European club, which is cleverly situated in a region that doesn't require a large "homegrown" roster, to start racking up reps against elite competition. With a large enough population that gets to Europe, you're likely to find a golden goose player that can be "sold" to a major European club for a very very hefty transfer fee (i.e. millions and millions of euros), that is then reinvested into the pipeline.

By this point the player will be good enough that the national team (NT) will beg him to join. Why? Because it's a win-win for them -- they get to keep mismanaging public funds lucratively while claiming success for the player's results.

Within a few cycles, India should have a squad that can achieve WC qualification -- it won't take a lot especially since the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) circuit is one of the weakest federations in the world. For example, the Australian national team has only 1 player that plays in a top European league.

Once that happens and the public is sufficiently crazy about football, everything else will fall into place just like cricket (and rather quickly at that too). No matter how corrupt India's sports ministry and the Board for the Control of Cricket in India (BCCI) are, there is far too much public scrutiny on the national team's performance for them to really fuck it up. The engine is in place so despite politician's best efforts, they can't really stop it. Now, that may seem like a ton of infra to setup, but India has some nice simplifying factors

1. Footballing culture is largely restricted to just a few pockets of the country: the Northeast states (Assam, Mizoram, Meghalaya, etc), Goa, Kerala, and West Bengal. No point mining anywhere else at the start.
2. We know a lot more about what genetic traits are highly valuable for football now than we did in 1999. For example, among elite footballers there is a significantly higher incidence of the ACTN3 (fast-twitch muscle fibers / sprinting) and ACE (oxygen efficiency / endurance) genes. And PIEZO2 (proprioception / spatial awareness) baselines are being researched increasingly as well. Further, these genetic markers are more prevalent in certain populations (e.g. Rajputs mirror the muscle composition of West African / Caucasians and high-altitude populations are known ACE carriers) which reduces the search space as well.

Of course, this will still require some megadonor who is passionate about football.

And they will probably have to come from outside the Indian Super League (ISL), India's top domestic football league, because the investors there, e.g. the Ambanis, are pure businesspeople who have significantly hampered the league to protect their investments.

For example, in England there is a tiered football league system where poor performance relegates a club to a lower division and a strong performance elevates a club to a higher division to allow new market entrants / incentivize existing ones to continue investing in player development. In contrast, the ISL (and MLS) are pay-to-play where you can get your club in (and keep it in the league) provided you pay the requisite annual membership fee.

There is progress happening as we speak though. Actor John Abraham (yes our favorite Dostana star) has owned a football club in India (NorthEast United FC) as a solo non-corporate owner since 2014 even though it causes him huge financial losses each year. It's purely a passion play for him. And now, after touring many many top European youth academies, he's building a similar academy in India with the intent to make it 100% scholarship, just like Right To Dream.

He just needs a single checkbook (and likely only a $10M upfront investment at that) to believe, and the machine will begin.

I'm optimistic, but for now, Dima Maghreb / long live Morocco!

I’m 20 tbh my life is not going anywhere, shitty relationships with my parents

I feel my last resort to join marines or US Air Force just wanna know if any of you joined or someone joined how’s it’s different, knowing that it would change you and away from civilian lifestyles

I'm 26F Indian and I feel like the women I've grown up around, extended family members and some Indian friends from university are so nasty and rude about my appearance. For context, I'm average pretty, dress glamorous, do my makeup, curvy, and I get attention from men, and i have defined 2c curly hair that are like ringlets at times.

My mum and my sister criticise my appearance so much. Everything from my weight to telling me im disgusting if i wear tight clothes, hating on my nail polish colour or nose piercing. My mum always told me that one day I'll get fat like her and my husband might leave me too. When I straighten my hair, they also have strong reactions and tell me I look bad even though i get so many compliments outside family. I've been at weddings where my mums friends will say my hairstyle doesnt suit me or that I dont look as nice.

My best friend is also Indian and shes literally told me that curvy bodies are not trendy anymore, she's always asked in front of other people why men are even into me. She told me the only nice thing about me are my boobs. In the same breath, when I told her I wear sports bras in the gym, shes said that nobody is admiring me, and that they're all judging me for showing cleavage. Recently she said if she wore tight clothes like me, she'd feel insecure all the time.

To clarify I've met so many loving and good hearted brown women, but the ones above have literally contributed to my body dysmorphia. I just don't understand why some people talk to me that way and feel comfortable critiquing my fashion choices.

Im 26F and just got out of a serious relationship with a guy I was planning to get married to later this year. He met my family who are conservative, religious Muslims and they gave us a deadline of September to get a Nikah (Islamic marriage). We both had a chat several weeks later and admitted that neither were ready to get married and decided to part ways due to other incompatibility issues.

I've told my family I want to move out and live alone, potentially work abroad in my late 20s, and just become more independent but they told me I'm stupid and that I'd call my mum crying if I did any of those things because i couldnt cope. For context, I have a successful career, financially independent, contributing to the household, but lived at home to maximise savings for the past 5 years since I graduated from uni.

Despite being successful and independent, my relationship suffered because my family would lose their shit every time I stayed over at a friend's place (I was actually staying at my bfs), threaten to kick me out if I leave the house past 9pm and constantly critique my clothing. I still have to change my outfit when I leave the house because of how hard it is. I cant wear tank tops even in 35 degree weather. Im basically stuck in my room a lot.

Am I stupid and immature for wanting to live alone in London or travelling. I dont think I can grow or get into another relationship until I live alone.

I normally hate the idea of posting on reddit but I’ve been ranting to my friends a little too much that I need to rant here so they can catch a break. I also have no idea how to navigate with the rage my parents instill in me.

I (20F) have started to notice just how incredibly negative and mean my family is for literally no reason whatsoever.

When I was vacationing in India, I was talking to my mom about how it was tiring how people in India (mostly my family) are so negative, judgmental, and take everything too seriously. My mom agreed and said it was tiring her, so I thought we were on the same page. Guess not.

Came back to the US and started to understand why I was so badly behaved back in high school. Since I’ve started college, I haven’t been home much and even when I was home over the summer, I was working a 9-5 so I didn’t really spend time with my parents much.

Now I notice my parents are always complaining about something, always being judgmental about something, and are incredibly sensitive and can’t take a joke or handle a situation without getting angry or yelling. It’s genuinely mood killing and I hate whenever my parents interact with me. I’ve learned trying to argue or reason is not useful, so I tend to lock myself in the room if I start to get pissed off.

Even my brother is just so mean for no reason. It’s crazy because he’s super nice to his friends but he genuinely looks down on me for some reason.

I just feel sad now. I can’t stand the thought of being here for another month. I was planning to go to the library everyday to study and try to hang out with my friends as much as possible but my mom always gets weird about me having friends and I’m like omg I’m sorry you only have toxic friendships maybe it’s because you’re a mean person who is always talking about your friends being fat or ugly bruh 😭

We met for a first date and things were going really well. We’re both born and raised in Germany, but have south Asian backgrounds. Towards the end of the date I brought up the topic of long-term intentions because I didn’t want to waste anyone’s time. I told her honestly that I’m the type of person who needs to really know someone over a longer period — probably around two years — before I can decide if I see marriage in the future.

She said she understands my point and respects it, but on her side the parental pressure is higher. She’d prefer to know after about one year whether this is going to be long-term or not. She’s 31 and I get where she’s coming from, in our culture, especially for women, there’s often a lot of family expectation around marriage and kids by a certain age.

Still, two years doesn’t feel crazy to me. I want to be sure and not rush into something as serious as marriage. But now I’m wondering if I’m being too rigid or if her timeline is more reasonable given her situation.

Has anyone been in a similar spot? How do you balance Western-style dating (taking your time, really knowing the person) with the cultural/family clock that seems to tick louder for women?

Would appreciate honest perspectives.

Has anyone here cut off your relationship with your parents. I want to do it badly but very scared at the same time. I really don’t care if they become homeless or not at this point.

The main reason being, for them I can’t pursue my dream life to leave USA & do whatever I want to because I have to financially support them. They are able to work but choose not to & they require me to give them money every month in nyc. For reference I’m a (31f).

Thanks for any suggestions!

Hello Guys!

I am Due a baby girl next month and still don’t have a name! I am really struggling to find a name that goes well with my first born daughter who is called ‘Inayah’.

Any Suggestions or ideas at all please?! 🙏🏽

Thank you!! ☺️ 🌸

I just got a job offer for a company located there. From what I gather, Phoenix has a much bigger desi population. Anything desi people should know if they're looking to move in?

It's not a band, it is one of the rarest blood types. 1 in 10,000 people have this in Mumbai, but globally only 4 in a million do.

People with this blood type can only receive blood from those who also have Bombay blood.

It can be mistaken for type O blood in usual tests. I'm no doctor, but if you are type-O then you should consider donating, they would test for this phenotype and register you as a rare donor.

Both parents constantly work and when they are out of work they are constantly moving around to do stuff in the home and never sit down. Add a disabled sibling to this that needs caretaking and it’s just almost 24/7 activity. Plus the family related social events is another thing. I help them with alot of things, but I think I’ve came down with mononucleosis (from sharing drinks). I’ll probably go get tested soon, but I definitely have the textbook symptoms when I looked it up online. Not sure how to tell parents that I’ll need to physically rest a lot without them thinking I’m a generational disappointment or what excuse they have for the relatives as their societal standing is very important to them.
- also are there any desis out there with mono or had it before? I feel like I haven’t seen anyone like that yet haha. But any advice for this is or getting over this is so much appreciated.

Capo Verde just finished their match against Argentina where they took them into extra time and responded back after falling behind twice. Even though Capo Verde lost 3-2, their effort is so impressive. Many of us probably haven’t heard of Capo Verde until today but why can’t India find 15-20 players that can play soccer. Is it that hard?

This is shameful, literally an embarrassment and the people running the country have no shame. My dad brags about India being able to field 5 T20 cricket teams. No one cares about cricket outside of South Asia really. It’s declining in Australia, New Zealand, and England. People brag about cricket when BCCI literally rigs to pitches to flat decks to favor their own batsmen. This is literally shameful. There are no fitness standards for even cricket. You guys seen Rohit Sharma. Even Sachin Tendulkar, Ajinkya Rahane, and Sunil Gavaskar look like people who never seen the weight room and these are the athletes that India brag about?

Cricket requires no physicality or athletic ability. Bowling and fielding are harder but India aren’t good in that department either. India is so determined to make themselves an international embarrassment and embarrass all of us on a global stage. Shoutout to Capo Verde. Shoutout to Geeta and Babita Phogat. Geeta and Babita can fight and had to show some physicality. Those are athletes. Not some 5’3 120 guys that haven’t seen a weight room. We have so many people and so much potential we waste on this stupid sport which no one really cares about. No other country is this obsessed over such a lame sport and these boomers are literally an embarrassment to South Asian representation. Tilak Varma and Abhishek Sharma provided more good representation that Sunil Tendulkar or Sunil Gavaskar ever have. This is just a shame.

Mainlander here, I am trying to blend in by looking like an American in America but my accent is where I am struck at.

It’s not a very thick Indian accent but not a fluent one as well. I have noticed how people kinda ignore me when they hear my accent including ABCDs. So I want to improve it without looking like a guy with fake accent. I don’t wanna get trolled by my friends for that.

Anyone here had to learn American accent? Any tips?

Edit: this was not on a professional context. Purely my personal and social life thing.

Do any guys on here, prefer if their partner makes less than them? As in, you will not date someone that makes significantly more than you?

I was talking about this with one of my friends (non-Desi), who said that he does not want to date a woman with a "real" career, so that she's able to take care of the kids, when they're still young. Which I thought was understandable.

But with how expensive things are nowadays, at least for myself, I would prefer if both of us worked. I wouldn't mind if she made more than me, I would probably see it as a plus. As that means we could afford to live in a HCOL area, if we wanted to.

Of course, some women only want to date someone who makes more than them. But in this scenario, I'm making the assumption that they don't care about that.

I was watching a TikTok abt a guy who paved a desi persons driveway and instead of paying the agreed price he started to negotiate and the comments were just ppl talking abt how they had similar experiences.

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