The Daily Telegraph Life Begins at 30 "By the time she is 30, she will be having a husband coming from a very good family, I see two boys born within a year of each other and a very big house. Yes, it is almost like a rajah's palace. One warning though: she must be careful with her weight, for she will be fat, almost unable to move, for the wealth she consumes." This is what the astrologer told my parents in a bid to reassure them when they went to consult him as to why I was not married at 25. I am now 33. None of the above has happened. In Indian terms, I am passed my sell-by date, well and truly consigned to the back shelf of the larder with the old stash of chapatti flour. Relatives have stopped pitying me, focusing instead on young Janaki, who at 23 is bursting with marriage potential and whose biological clock is melodically ticking, as opposed to mine that supposedly exploded on my thirtieth birthday. "I mean who would even think of having children after thirty?" asked my aunt as I blew out the candles. So the only children that are ever mentioned are the grand children (my brother's children) and the children born to my contemporaries in Kerala, South India. Having detonated every single one of my parents' aspirations (stable career with lots of money, husband and two children), for me, life has truly begun at 30. There are no rules anymore, no expectations. There is no need to put on a suit and pretend to go to work as I did in my 20s (sad but true). I had led a double life for most of my 20s. It is a long story, but basically, I wanted to be a writer and so left my job as a management consultant, thinking that I, too, would be sipping red wine and signing books. However, things did not go to plan as I got rejected by every publisher. I then took the deposit from the flat I was about to buy and had this crazy idea to set up my own publishing company and PR company. Headed by my alias Pru Menon, she/I hyped my novel, got it into the London book charts and sold it off as part of a three-book deal to HarperCollins - all whilst waving my parents off as I pretended to catch the tube to work and whilst giving them false hope that they, too could soon sent out the wedding invitations. There is no list system now. The list system is a preferred system of potential suitors. First choice - well-educated, professional Keralan boy; second - preferably of Asian decent; and so forth. But this has been shredded. My mother said to me the other day: "Bring anyone home, if you want to have a baby and are not married, that's OK by us too." Being caught between cultures where 30 is retirement age and 30 is the new 20 is fantastic. It's like looking in the mirror, knowing you have defied fate and seeing all sorts of possibilities. I'm living in a culture where eggs can be frozen as opposed to curried and fed to husband and children. Knowing that I haven't stuffed my face with all those ledos and barfis (as predicted by the astrologer), but am happily still doing Cobra, Stretch pose, Downward dog and still defying gravity, gives me a certain sense of satisfaction. Living in England, the only downside to 30 is choice - latte, mocha, expresso, frappe, cappuccino, decaf, as opposed to your good old Keralan coffee with sugar already added. And secretly, I am fearing what I am going to do now the list system has been scrapped. Before it was, get introduced by your parents (all leg work done by them i.e. dark secrets exposed, major incompatibilities and annoying habits pre-screened) exchange a few embarrassed smiles, decide if you like the look of each other and then get married. Now, with the whole of the United Nations' pool of men opened up to me, where do I start? And who can I blame if it all goes horribly wrong? But with a feeling of total liberation and of course a plethora of self-help books to aid me along my journey, I shall continue full sail, even if haphazardly, through the possibility of adventure that comes from being in my 30s. Preethi Nair's new book "The Colour of Love" (HarperCollins) is published on Monday.