A Peek at How I Meet Guys in China

Okay, so I know you gossip mongers wanna know about my love life. New city, all new group of guys to meet, right?

I’m a modern woman, and the best way to meet people is online. I use an app called momo. I’ve written about it before. Its a dating app, location sensitive, and you can talk, send pics, chat etc. It’s entirely in Chinese, no english version, so you gotta be fluent-ish to use it. And not a lot of foreigners are on it, especially foreign women. Also in my profile I say I can speak chinese (in Chinese) so I get a lot of people contacting me. How many? Well, in 3 weeks I have over 500 contact requests that I didn’t reply to. So yeah, a lot.

So how do I chose who to respond to? Well, I have two little rules.
First, no one under 24. I live on campus and there are a few universities in the area, and I think anything with a student, even if they aren’t mine, is just wrong. Also, that’s one hell of an age difference.

Second, they have to have a real picture. Of themselves. It’s unbelievable how many guys just have a picture of a car, or a tree, or a Japanese cartoon character. What girl is ever going to respond to that?

Although even if they do have a picture, you gotta learn to spot the fakes. One guy had a pretty cute picture, but his age was 35. His picture looked younger. But maybe he aged well? So I asked. He said it wasn’t a real picture, just one of some guy he thought was good looking.

“I’m uglier than this picture,” he said. “I’m old looking.”
“Don’t girls get mad at you for lying when they meet you?” I asked.
“Luckily, I’ve never met a girl from this app.” He said
“Isn’t that kind of the purpose?” I asked.
“You meet people?!” he asked me seemingly shocked. Our conversation didn’t last long, but I appreciated his naive honesty.

Those two rules weed out the bulk of people and the rest I chose, quite shallowly, on looks and their profile. Some guys admit they are married, directly in their profile. There is only one purpose of momo, and no married guy should be looking for that. So those guys I avoid.

But sometimes they don’t say, so it’s a question I bring up pretty early in the conversation. “Are you married?” One guy said, “yeah.” And then, “Wanna go on a date?” When I replied that NO I didn’t want to go out with a married guy he defended himself by saying “It’s okay because my wife lives somewhere else.” No buddy, that ain’t okay.

Another guy told me he was married, and several days later asked me to go out. I said, “No, you’re married.”
He said, “No I’m not, I’m single!”
“You already told me,” I replied.
“You have a good memory.”
Yeesh.

But if I like the looks of a guy, and his profile, I’ll chat back. Some guys are interesting because their approaches are more unique. Most of the time I just get “hey beauty,” or “I really want to meet you” or even “make love?” But those I tend not to respond to. Instead I like the people who start with something more interesting.

One guy I was chatting with said that I wasn’t a foreigner, but in fact we were from the same hometown. “Oh, I’m Chinese now? ” I asked him.
“We are neighbors,” he replied. “We’re living in a global village, so of course we’re neighbors.” I thought that was cute and way better than the “I love America, especially the NBA,” which I hear all the time.

And instead of asking me if I’m really a foreigner, another guy asked me if I was from mars. And could I speak martian? Points for making me laugh at least.

I chat with a guy for several days before I agree to meet them, just to get a feeling for them. If they start to say stuff like, “I miss you” before I even meet them, or insist on me doing things, like cooking for them, I think they are too clingy and not what I’m looking for. I usually give them a little warning like, “You shouldn’t say that,” or “I’m not your wife, I’m not going to cook for you.” But some don’t get the message.

I was chatting with this guy and he just wasn’t getting it. One night he asked what I was doing and I said making dinner. He said “Why didn’t you call me! I’ll come right over!” I was like no, not interested in making you dinner and he kept saying, again and again, “You can make me dinner everyday.” I kept saying no, there was no way I was going to do that, and finally he said, “I can make you dinner.”
“Great idea.” I replied.
“I was just kidding,” he replied. “I only eat your food, I don’t cook.” I haven’t chatted with him since.

And then there was this guy. He failed my profile picture test (the only pic he had was of a tree.) So I didn’t respond. But that didn’t put him off and he kept contacting me day after day. Notice the dates as you read through them.

Finally, just to get him to shut up I wrote back in Chinese saying I didn’t respond to people without pictures. He then asked if I was Chinese. I said no. Then he asked if I was a foreigner.

“If I’m not Chinese then obviously I’m a foreigner, right?!”
He had been contacting me non-stop for days and THIS is what he asks me when I finally write back? It was just a bit too dumb for me and I stopped writing back. He STILL continues to contact me.

I’ll admit I have a really good time using this app and chatting with people. It’s great for my Chinese, especially my writing, and I just like meeting new people and getting to know things about the area. Even if I never meet them I just get a good idea of the area, and have gotten some great information about things going on. And I get to meet a bunch of handsome guys in the process? Win-win.