Meet some amazing creatures that inhabit our world and currently reside in Shanghai.
(All names have been changed to protect privacy)
VIP
Psychological tricks? Smart and not ordinary questions? Lots of quotes? You are on a date with a VIP and 'I Know Everything What You Want'. Unfortunately, he's the only person who thinks so.
Asking me to eat before the date, living in an apartment worse and smaller than mine and boasting about working for himself...as a blogger, known to...probably few people, while being old enough to have own family and a senior position? Still cool. Still VIP.
Drinking 1 glass of wine for the whole night? Breaking into my apartment after me clearly saying 'no', showing me magical tricks and breathing techniques to make me tear off my dress? Still cool. Still VIP.
To sum up: It's very simple to recognize these guys and extremely hard not to laugh. However, important to note, usually after reaching the peak of self-embarrassment they leave, with an epic phrase of course, looking at themselves in the mirror.
Signature phrase: 'I'm so awesome'.
Don't trust your mom
I don't usually go for a date with those guys, I know for relatively long time and haven't been considering for a potential relationship.
Derek was my university classmate, can't even call him a friend and usually we haven't been discussing anything except projects and uni things. After I've graduated and got a job, I received his comment under my photo, wondering why a I drinking without him. The conversation got triggered.
After a while he told me he will be back to Shanghai next day and would be happy to see me. I definitely took it as a friendly dinner and nothing more. And he was one of very few guys that my mom really 'approved'. Moreover, they had a round table at the restaurant and the verdict was: Great guy! Wide smile means open mind.
Our friendly dinner continued at the bar, where we had a deep talk about past relationships. So far, not that bad, if not concentrating on the fact, that he wasn't satisfied with almost anything (seat at the restaurant, food, no cab, wrong address, etc.). I decided to ignore this negativity and explain it by his jet-lag.
And then he kissed me. The nights was getting less like 'friends-meetup'. Even though, Derek was very attractive, I was very surprised by his move.
Me met next day for a dinner at my place. And it was obviously not the type of a guy anybody's mom would be happy about. Maybe it was the first time when psychiatric concilium got it wrong. Apart from being unsatisfied with the shape of wine glasses, music and questions why there is a soy sauce, but not the salt in the rice, I was sure he's here not just for dinner.
And of course i haven't heard from him again.
In short: Your mom could be perfect in reading people, but if you have gut feeling - trust yourself. Guys can project completely different personality on photos and when you don't know them well.
Signature phrase: 'Why your refrigerator is here? I think it's not that convenient.'
It's not that easy
Merrill contacted me in Instagram in a response to my rhetorical question: 'Where is my prince?'. It reminded a typical love story, when two people from different countries fall in love, eventually meet and get married.
However, not in this case. Even though I was receiving tons of messages everyday, photos, video calls, there were no actions. Merrill was telling me how great life is at the place, where he lives and works: a huge house, expensive car, opportunities to travel all the time..Mixed with him swearing his love, I was expecting him to visit me in the nearest future. I even sent him flights schedule, when he asked. But..It was not that easy.
When I was asking what exactly is not, there was no further explanation. Moreover he was telling me to pack up and come to live with him, without seeing this offer as an absurd. My denial was making him angry and leading to hours of repeating of how beautiful his life is and so mine could be.
No matter that I was shooting daily videos for him, staying awake till 3 am to Skype, I was the one making everything complicated. It was interesting how his big words: 'I'm so in love with you! I can't wait to see you anymore! I'm coming in 2 weeks', changed to 'Why you don't want to move to my country? You don't trust me?'. Apart from tons of love messages, there were tons of 'ifs': If I would be there, I would...If we would be together now, I would... Well...I believe if you truly want something, you will find a way. Like videos that I mentioned and even a cool surprise that I sent by mail. And he was just talking without any actions proving his words.
Definitely I ended all this, as if it was talking so much of my time, making me exhausting and even being blamed sometimes. He was sometimes even unhappy that I was sending him not as many videos as before! And after I told him that our 2 month online 'relationship' is going nowhere, just me listening that I should come to him and everything is complicated, I expected something more than: 'Ok. Bye!'.
To sum up: Texting is not a relationship and words are not actions. It could be fun for beginning, but then it's either he comes to visit you, or it's done, otherwise all your energy will be spent for nothing.
Signature phase: 'I don't want to stop it here! I love you!'
and then 'OK, Bye'.