I nodded. ‘Goodbye’ had been on the tip of my tongue, but now I swallowed it, afraid to let myself speak at all.
He got in his car, and I waved to him from the porch. I continued to wave even after he drove out of sight.That would be his last memory of me, I thought, before letting myself back in the house.

I awoke to a loud knock. My mother had charged into my room and was waking me up. Apparently, my alarm had not gone off. I looked at the time, it was 6:13 AM.

I had been dreaming, it turned out, but my dream was surprisingly similar to what took place on my porch just under 3 hours ago. MFL and I had not kissed, and I had not delivered my ‘I love you’ monologue, but everything else had really happened.

I did not let myself dwell on my dream, instead, I jumped into the shower to wake myself up. It seemed I still wasn’t over MFL, would I ever be? I felt like a haunted woman, but what kind of exorcist could free me from my particular ghost, the ghost of my first love?

By the time I stepped out of the shower, all of these thoughts were washed from me. It was as if the dream never happened. Instead, I busied myself with some final packing.

On the way to the airport, I was feeling particularly emotional. Even though I knew I would be coming back to visit my parents and friends, I wasn’t sure I would ever move back here. I hid my face everytime my eyes watered though, I didn’t want my father to see me cry. My parents, after all, were probably already feeling sad to see to me go, if they saw how hard it was for me to say goodbye, they would tell me to call the whole thing off and stay. But I couldn’t.

My flight to Nanjing was complicated. I would first be flying to New York, then getting on a 13.5-hour flight to Beijing, and then getting on another 2-hour flight to Nanjing. It was a full 24 hours of travel time in total; add in the 12-hour time difference between China and Canada and I was fully disoriented by the time I got off the plane.

On the whole, my trip was extremely successful. The 13.5-hour flight across the Pacific was very comfortable by economy-class standards. The flight was only half-full, so there were empty seats next to each passenger. I had checked-in early, since I had a 5-hour wait in JFK (there is no pre-check-in for Air China, so they weren’t able to print boarding passes for me in Toronto), so I was sitting relatively forward in the plane¹, and there were no screaming children around me. Anticipating jet-lag, I only allowed myself to sleep five hours on the plane, even though I was quite drowsy. When I got off the plane, I knew it would be night-time, so I’d be expected to sleep again. I passed the time by reading ‘Harry Potter: The Deathly Hallows’. I’d read the whole thing in six hours the night it was released, but as I re-read it, I realized I had very little recollection of it. It took me closer to nine hours to read it this time around.

Heat and humidity hit me like a wall when I stepped off the plane in China. I was thankful for my short hair, which I’d cut only two days before leaving. I had been apprehensive all week about the haircut, because I haven’t had short-hair since I was in elementary school, when my parents cut my hair. It had essentially taken me a life-time to cultivate my long hair, not to mention the hundreds of dollars I’d dropped on it months before. But I bit the bullet and had it all cut off. Now my hair was an angled bob; it was so short I barely recognized myself in the mirror.

My aunt and uncle met me at the Nanjing airport and soon I was home, or at least home for the next week. It occurred to me in the airport that between now and September, I have no home, so I’ve decided to call all my temporary lodgings as ‘home’.

1. I hate sitting behind the wings, it’s too loud.

Ah, Paris, the city of lights.

For me, Paris was the city of world-famous art museums, night-time strolls, and impeccably trimmed gardens. I wore scarves. I walked along the Seine. I ate Pierre Hermé macarons. I went to the Louvre – three times. I had wine on the Pont Neuf bridge. I made a four-course gourmet meal in our apartment. I went shopping in the Saint-Germin-des-Pres district. I dined until midnight on a street patio of a corner cafe on the Pont de L’Ile Saint Louis. I found myself in a block party. I drank wine on our balcony as I watched the sun set behind the Eiffel Tower. I bought art from street painters in the Latin Quarter. I got scouted by a French film director outside the Notre Dame. I napped in the Versailles gardens.

I fell in love, with Paris.

And I met a boy.

I met SHB on a pub crawl through Montmartre, which started at Moulin Rouge and ended at a club on the Champs-Élysées. He was into me the moment he saw me. I, on the other hand, was looking for more of a challenge. But my wing-man for the night, Vin Diesel, said this guy checked out. SHB was a) from Singapore, and b) from business school. That was all I really needed to know.

In between kamikaze shots, I learned that he had been on exchange at the business school in Norway. Incidentally, two of my friends from Business School had also been on exchange there. So we knew people in common. I warmed up to this stranger instantaneously.
I like that he laughed at my jokes and dressed well. He liked that I was funny and dressed well. It was like a match made in heaven.

Almost.

There’s always a caveat, isn’t there?

He was getting perfect 10s on everything. But he lost a point when he told me to flirt with the bartender in order to “upgrade” to stiffer drinks. I mean, why, oh why, would you encourage the girl you’re interested in to flirt with someone else, bar-god-in-charge-of-drinks or not? And he lost another point for not offering to pay 2 euros for me to use the bathroom. Yes, it’s ridiculous that there is a cover charge to use the bathroom inside the club, and yes, it’s ridiculous that it was anything more than 0.50 EUR like all other bathroom-cover-charges. But I didn’t ask him to buy me a single drink all evening (nor did he offer – don’t think I didn’t notice) because I know, I know, we’re all students, traveling, poor, etc. etc. But seriously, when it comes to 2 euros, regardless of what it’s for¹, it’s not about the money anymore, it’s about the chivalry. Be a gentleman and at least offer.

Otherwise, we had a fantastic night. He was a great dancer, made even more impressive by the fact that 99% of the Asian guys I have met in my life are terrible dancers and usually skulk on the edge of the dance floor. Although his -2 points made me wonder whether he was The One for me, he was definitely The One for the night. We danced and danced, and when we tired of dancing, we made out on the couches.

You might say, “But SG, you don’t make out with guys when you actually like them!” And you would be right, but we were in Paris, who knew if I was going to see him again?

He was leaving for Barcelona the next day, but he immediately added me on Facebook (+1 for enthusiasm, +1 for not pestering me with demanding messages) and asked for my Skype contact. I didn’t give it to him, because Skype is kind of an escalation of commitment (isn’t it?) and I wasn’t sure I was ready for that. Instead, we have been chatting somewhat regularly on Facebook² and he seems to be looking forward to my arrival in Singapore.

So, at least I have one date when I get to Singapore.

1. I know it’s hard for many North Americans to stomach the injustice of having to pay for restrooms, much less restrooms inside of clubs that already charge a 20 euro cover.
2. We’ve been playing a game of Facebook tag because of the time difference. He is still traveling whereas Paris was my last stop.

My perspective was that I had to get married. I would not be happy without marriage. In fact, I wanted to get engaged by the time I was 26 and married by the time I was 27. BI is already 26, so this sort of talk no doubt alarmed her. She was ready for a serious relationship now, but she certainly wasn’t sold on marriage. In fact, if she had a committed relationship that never led to marriage, she would be just as content.

Although we could not agree on the “need” for marriage, there was one thing we could agree on: relationships² are not what they used to be. And we believe this is mostly because women’s roles in society have changed.
In the past, women were financially dependent on their male counterparts. Thus, finding a husband was absolutely necessary for survival. Nowadays, women are financially independent, which means finding a husband (or a life partner) is no longer about need, but about want.

I’ve talked about this before but I had another realization this time. The tricky thing with “want”, and the reason for all these failed marriages nowadays, is that “want” changes much more quickly and easily than “need.” A need for a breadwinner exists perpetually, unless you win the lottery or a huge inheritance falls into your lap out of nowhere. However, without that need, what you want becomes rather capricious. What you want can change several times a week, much less a lifetime. For example, right now, you may want someone who can make you laugh and cheer you up no matter what, around whom you are more impulsive and fun. But in five or ten years, maybe you’ll want someone who can take things seriously, who won’t make light of things that are important, and who can be a steady rock, no matter how boring and predictable. As a result of these changing “wants”, not only does your life partner feel superfluous for not being able to satisfy a need, but they feel uneasy because they are at risk of being kicked aside on a whim.

Of course, I exaggerate the effect of this problem, but it is indeed a real problem. Unless our need for human companionship³ is as strong as our need for survival, a marriage for a lifetime no longer seems plausible.

The rain stopped just as we were about to buy tickets to see Blue Man’s Group, since we decided that doing something indoors was the best course of action on a rainy day. Seeing that the rain stopped, we decided to go to Millennium Park after all. If we can change our mind three times during the course of one day, how will I be sure what I want for the rest of my life?

1. In China, when you near the age of 30, people around you start frantically setting you up on dates, with the idea that if you like what you see, you’ll get married. This is very similar to practices in Korea and India.
2. Marriage being the ultimate form of a relationship.
3. But I question the strength of a marriage if the philosophy behind is companionship for companionship’s sake.

Her story got me thinking. What is the point of a long engagement? I mean, if you love someone, and they love you, why wait a year, or two, to get married? Why date for three or five or eight years? What are you waiting for?

If you never want to get married, then fine, I will put you in the “never getting married” box and ignore you. But what about the rest of you? Are you testing the waters? Do you want “to be sure”?

I’ve always thought that I’d date at least two years before my engagement, and then another one year before the wedding. But now that I think about it, why do I need those three years “to be sure”? I know there are people who have been married for over 20 years, and they say that they were always sure about their feelings for each other. Good for them. Me, I don’t think I’ll ever be sure. I don’t think I’ll be sure after dating someone for two years, I don’t think I’ll be sure if we lived together for four years, and I don’t think any length of engagement will make me “sure”.

Maybe being sure isn’t about the other person but about myself. Maybe I am just somebody who can’t be sure of how I feel. That doesn’t make it any less real.

I’ve always admired how quickly marriages were decided in the old days. You’d court for a little while, and if you found each other to be pleasant, the man would propose, and a wedding would take place soon after. In those circumstances, you would only see each other a few times before the engagement, always in public settings. Now we have all these checkpoints in place like anniversaries and co-habitation and long engagements, and still we have people (like myself) who never seem to be sure. When will it ever be enough? It’s like the show “Who Wants to be a Millionaire”, every time the host asks “Is that your final answer?” you re-evaluate yourself one more time. He could ask you a million times, and you would still hesitate. At some point, you just have to bite the bullet and say, “Yes, that is my final answer.”

So Erika, you have inspired me to re-evaluate my position on long lead times for marriage. Perhaps in a few months, I will be married too. (Ok, probably not, but anything could happen.)

This was the exchange BI and I had on Saturday night. She bumped into me as I was leaving The Club. I must have had a stupid grin on my face, because she guessed right away that it was boy-related.

“Why don’t you just pick one?” BI asked incredulously.
“They’re leaving tomorrow, what’s the point?”
“That’s even better! You should take advantage of tonight.”
“Believe me, I have had enough attention tonight to last me months. I’m good.”
She could see that I meant it, so she let me go.

I went home feeling particularly pleased with myself. Sure, I was flattered by all the attention I had received, but I couldn’t be too attached. Because it felt too good to be true, it couldn’t be real. And I wanted to walk away before something brought me crashing down to earth.

Rewind back four days and I’m standing in the middle of a crowded banquet hall, greeting forty-four students from eleven different countries and glad-handing eleven advisors (professors that accompanied them) from their respective business schools. It was the beginning of The Case Competition, and I, as one of the main organizers, was feeling relieved to see that everyone had made it and that Opening Ceremonies went without a hitch. I had been planning this competition for months, emailing back and forth with their advisors and business schools, so I knew their names by heart and was only now meeting them in real life.
They were an incredibly friendly group, not to mention astoundingly good-looking. If I didn’t know better, I’d say we had invited a group of international vampires as opposed to business students.

Although I was exhausted for the next four days, running around from 8am to past midnight every day, going home only to collapse on my bed for barely five hours, it was totally worth it. The delegates that came were all open to new things and eager to make friends. Everyone was having a great time, and I was having just as good a time becoming fast friends with all of them, which was exactly as I expected.

What I didn’t expect was that I would be such a hit with the gentlemen. For example, for most of Friday, I hung out with the German team because I found them to have a surprising sense of humour. Friday’s events included going on a brewery tour, dinner at the campus restaurant, and having an egg drop challenge. By the end of the night, NGB was asking me out. I couldn’t believe it. Although he was cute, I didn’t like him that way, but I didn’t turn him down immediately. He was leaving a day later than the rest of his team, so he wanted to take me out on his last day. I said I would check my schedule and get back to him.
The fact that he asked me out after only hours of getting to know me was shocking, not because this sort of thing never happens, but because I was starting to take the game-playing tactics of most North American boys for granted. I mean, PLB liked me for months and yet he was still pretending not to like me until the very last moment. Here, it would take months of flirting and text-tagging and pretending not to be interested before a guy would ask me out. But it took NGB less than eight hours, and he was very upfront about it. He wasn’t hiding the fact that he was into me. In fact, it was written so clearly on his face, his actions, and of course his up-front question, that by North American standards, I’d say he was completely smitten.

The next day, the other boy on his team, SGB also made up his mind to tell me he liked me. Wow, two boys in two days? This never happens to me.
What really boggled my mind was the fact that their two other teammates were by far the best looking girls at the competition. They were fair, perfectly-proportioned, tall, beautiful, long-haired German goddesses. Next to them, I looked like a gorilla. So how was it possible that these two German boys both set their sights on me? I couldn’t make any sense of it.

On Saturday night, after the case competition was over, we booked out a VIP area of The Club and everyone was in full party mode. The Brazilians and New Zealanders were going absolutely wild, and everyone else was caught up in the frenzy. I danced with more gorgeous boys in one night than I have in my entire life. There was the incredibly tall and unbelievably well-featured Mexican, the handsome Norwegian that looked like a sculpture, the strong Brazilian that could pick me up with one hand, the dancing Mexican that spun me round and round, and the unbelievably good-looking slim Norwegian boy who I spent most of the night with. SNB was the second best looking boy at the competition, second only to his teammate, the Sculpture Norwegian. When SNB started dancing with me, I could see all the girls (and even some of the boys) watching us. I was thoroughly embarrassed, made even worse when one of my co-volunteers, a guy, came up to us and shouted to me over the music, “Hold on to that one, he is way too good-looking.”

Maybe BI didn’t understand why I would pass up an opportunity to make the most of a night like that, but by 1am, I knew it was time for me to leave. It was almost straight out of Cinderella, as if my clothes would turn to rags and my carriage would turn into a pumpkin if I stayed any longer. On nights like these, I want to end on a high note, and there was nothing that could possibly happen to improve my night. What BI didn’t know when she ran into me was that I had already received more than my fair share of male attention:

• Dirty dancing with the hottest Mexican I have ever seen: check.
• Being the only girl to be picked up and spun by a Mexican, a Brazilian, and a German in front of everybody in the club: check.
• Flattery from a ridiculously good-looking Norwegian: check.
• Kisses from a ridiculously good-looking Norwegian: check.
• Confessions from two cute Germans: check.

Of course, I was the epitome of “that lucky girl” that night. But what made me smile the morning after was not just because I felt flattered, but because I realized that there was hope.

After all my experiences with boys in university, and all the shows you see on TV like Sex and The City, I was really starting to believe that all men played games. That no one would put themselves out there and be true to their emotions. That even if they liked you, they wouldn’t admit it unless someone put a gun to their head. That even if they admitted they liked you, they wouldn’t do anything about it.
All of these mind-games were making me beyond frustrated. I think one of the reasons I have been relationship-less this whole time is that I haven’t met anyone that made me feel like the hassle of all those mind-games was worth it.
And now, within a few days, I had met at least three eligible, absolutely date-able boys who were not afraid to say they liked me and do something about it.

Of course, I haven’t forgotten the fact that they may have felt they had to move quickly since they were only in Canada for a few days. But nonetheless, it gave me hope.

The question I still haven’t been able to answer however is, why the hell did they pick me? Seriously, the girls at this competition were just as stunningly beautiful as the boys were handsome. I have never felt less attractive in my life than when I was standing next to them. Of course, I still loved them because they were friendly and interesting. I mean, they were beautiful and had good personalities. As far as I’m concerned, they were perfect.
Yet these boys (more than one, incredibly) were smitten by my charms. Was it my friendliness? My humour? My weirdness? Regardless of the reason, they were willing to put themselves out there even if they weren’t quite sure whether my over-friendliness was flirting or just the way I am¹.

So, clearly, there is hope. Just maybe not in North America.

1. I.e. I could have been overly friendly because I’m Canadian and that’s just the way we are. Or it could have been because I was one of the organizers and I had to set a good example for the other volunteers and be a good host.

I was reflecting on this over coffee with BI yesterday, using it as an example of how I’ve changed since high school.
“I was so ignorant about what it meant to be in a relationship. I had no idea what was considered normal behaviour as far as showing one’s feelings. Sure, I showed him I cared in my own way, but maybe by missing out on all the cliched things, I made him feel more unsure about our relationship.”
Like a horse being whipped, words started tumbling out of my mouth at lightning speed. “I was so clueless! I didn’t know what it meant to be someone girlfriend. I didn’t know what to expect of anything. And I never talked about my feelings – not to him or to my friends.”
I took a breath.
“But now, now I know it’s ok to talk about my feelings. In fact, it’s expected that you tell your partner how you feel about them – they want to hear it! I also know it’s ok to talk to your friends about your relationship, I mean I’ve seen Sex and The City, which taught me all I need to know about commiserating. Since then, it seems like all I can talk about on my blog, with my friends, is boys! Boys, boys, boys!”
BI nodded with comprehension.
“Given that I’ve come such a long way in terms of understanding relationships between men and women, you’d think that I’d be better at it. But guess what? In the last four years, my longest relationship lasted two months.
That is the greatest irony of all. When I was in high school, I didn’t plan to have a relationship at all. I didn’t take high school relationships seriously and would have been just fine if I had graduated without ever having a boyfriend. Instead, I ended up in a three-year relationship.
But when I went to university, I was totally ready for a relationship, and guess what? In the last four years, I haven’t had a single relationship where I would actually call the boy ‘my boyfriend.’”

BI chuckled and shook her head. “Maybe ignorance is bliss after all. Once you knew what to expect, those expectations may have actually been a barrier to you falling for someone.”

Maybe she’s right. Maybe that’s why first loves seem so perfect – because they’re easy. We’re all clueless with our first love, and it’s a clean slate. Our expectations only grow from there.

But my own statistics still left me baffled. “Four years. Hundreds of boys on campus. I mean, you’d think I could find one genuine love interest, right? Even if my expectations have changed, what are the odds that I would not like a single person in four years of university?”

For that, BI had no answer.

I have had this sort of experience hundreds of times. I’ve been told that I have strong intuitions when it comes to whether a guy is interested in me¹, but most of the time, I cannot get any confirmation. More often than not, nothing becomes of it and I feel foolish for thinking a guy “like that” would like a girl “like me.” To experience this over and over again is a humbling practice.

But recently, I experienced the opposite, and I want a written record of this to remind myself that perhaps my intuition has been spot on more often than I thought.

When I went out on Friday night, I mentioned that I ran into a group of people I used to hang out with in first year. I never considered them to be my friends, but back in the day, we always seemed to be at the same parties. One of them, CG, used to live in my residence and was always very friendly. He was cute and we got along really well; I thought maybe he had a crush on me, but then I found out he had a girlfriend. I decided that he was just someone who was (naturally) overly friendly, but that he never actually liked me. I ran into CG two or three times since first-year, and he exhibited the same over-enthusiasm, which only confirmed my suspicions that this was the way he was. However, when he showed up at the club on Friday, he did not leave my side all night. Even DG noticed, but I kept telling her it didn’t mean anything. So, to prove to me that he really was interested, DG asked CG to buy us drinks. CG does not frequent bars and is not a big spender, but after looking over in my direction, he bought all of my friends and I drinks. He was a typical frugal Asian boy – he didn’t even buy himself a drink – but it looked like he was trying to impress me. I refused to be impressed and walked away, hissing to DG that she was not allowed to take advantage of him like that. “It only worked because of you,” she hissed right back.
For the rest of the night, CG continued to dance by my side, taking every opportunity to hold my hand or dance alone with me. He was all over me, not in a drunk, aggressive kind of way, but in a “Is this my chance?” kind of way. It almost felt like he was relieved to have run into me again. I smiled to myself, even though I was no longer interested in him. All I could think was, “I was right! Back in the day, when I thought he might be interested in me, it wasn’t just my imagination. I was right! I was right!”
When he tried to talk to me at the end of the night, I already knew that he wanted. Before he could ask me about my relationship status, I cut him off. “It was nice seeing you again,” was all I said, and left.

The affirmation that my instincts were right came way too late, but that is not the point. The point is that my instincts were right, and from now on, I should not so carelessly dismiss myself just because someone’s actions does not match what I think. As I’ve already said, boys do not make sense, but that does not mean I should feel foolish. Instead, they are the ones to feel foolish, because I was right.

1. Maybe I am super sensitive, but I always notice when a guy makes physical contact, however casual.

My friend met this guy at the bar one night, and they really hit it off. They talked into early morning, and even had breakfast together. He told her that he couldn’t wait to see her again. She didn’t take it seriously, but gave him her number anyway. Over the next two weeks, he was texting her all day and calling her before bed every night. They saw each other a few more times and it seemed like he was crazy about her. Then, one night, he asks her to meet him at the bar. When she arrives, he was already there, grinding another girl.
In her words, “I couldn’t believe it. Not only was I confused since he had asked me to meet him there, but the girl he was grinding was totally ugly!”
I tried to decipher the cryptic behaviour, but could only conclude that the guy was a dumbass. I mean, even if he was out grinding other girls on the nights that they weren’t together, why invite her out to witness the event? He knew she was coming to meet him, did he want to get caught? Perhaps that was his way of telling her she didn’t mean that much to him.

—

Proof #2

When TDH singled me out on Friday night, all of our friends were there, dancing in a circle around us (literally, facing us). He seemed not to care, which is pretty bold for an Asian guy. Although I expected my friends to feel awkward about watching us grind, I later learned of another reason. Apparently, he had a girlfriend, who they were all close friends with (I knew of her as well, but I didn’t know they were going out), and the only reason she wasn’t there that night was because she was sick. How do you explain that?

—

Proof #3

For the first time in weeks, PLB said more than two words to me. What for? To invite me as his date to his friend’s wedding.
Are you kidding me?
You were the one who was all over me, forcing me to make plans with you on a night when I already had plans. You were the one who then unceremoniously blew me off with a lame excuse. If you were trying to make a point that you didn’t want to date me, that’s your prerogative and you made your point loud and clear. Fine, that’s fine. And then you invite me to your birthday party of close friends, none of whom are friends of mine. But that was a Facebook invite, so I ignored it. Now you’re telling me that, according to the Valentine’s Day questionnaire we filled out a month ago¹, I am your match, and therefore, I must be your date to your friend’s wedding?
I have two words for you: Not happening.
It turns out the acronym I gave him, “Preordained Lover” is a curse. Well, at this point, I don’t care how many signs there are that we are meant to be together, I don’t care if the hands of Fate herself reach out from an other-worldly portal to push us together, it is Not. Happening.

1. A fundraiser at our school for Haiti, you have to pay to get your results.

I seem to amaze people, although I am at a loss for why. Maybe they just don’t see it coming – you know, innocent little me, planning to have boytoys in every major city in Asia? Or any other scheme I come up with, really.

Later that day…

“Let’s meet in the morning on Sunday and spend as long as we need to to get through these cases.”
“9am?” Someone suggested. “That’s when we normally have class anyway.”
“I don’t think I can make it for 9. How about 10?” I piped up.
“Why? Do you have plans in the morning?”
“Well… sort of,” I said sheepishly. My teammates looked at me, waiting for me to continue. Finally, I said, “I have to make breakfast. You know, weekend breakfasts are pretty elaborate, they take time.”
Everyone burst into laughter. Then, when they realized I was being serious, they stared at me incredulously. “Your plans… are to make breakfast?”
“Well, normally I can eat breakfast on the go. But on weekends, I usually make a big breakfast – you know, scrambled eggs, pancakes… it takes time.”
Now they were looking at me like I was an alien. What? Was I so crazy to want to make myself a good breakfast once a week?
GSB finally chuckled and shook his head. “You are…” he trailed off, at a loss for words.
As the rest of my group begrudgingly agreed to meet at 10, I smiled smugly. Maybe I was “something” but I was going to have a big yummy breakfast on Sunday morning, and that’s all that mattered.

One of my classes is called “Global Strategy,” taught by a Taiwanese professor with a very thick Chinese accent. Half the time, I can’t understand what he’s saying, and I’m Chinese! It doesn’t help that listening to him speak makes me want to laugh. I can’t even hold it in, it’s that bad. His accent is so classically Asian, he can’t pronounce ses for the life of him, and he kind of makes up his own sounds when he doesn’t know exactly how something is pronounced. Like “strategy” comes out sounding like “training” – I mean, how do you even do that?
But even without the accent, he is a very amusing professor. In our first class, he was trying to convince us of the necessity of this class by showing us the extent of globalization (foreigners invading our home environment even if we don’t have any intention to go abroad).
“You wake up in the morning, you put on your underwear, made in China. You put on your jeans, made in Bangladesh. You put on your t-shirt, made in Pakistan. You drive to school in your car made in Japan. You buy a coffee, imported from Columbia. And then you get to class and you realize, your professor is imported from Taiwan!” (Imagine this whole monologue with a thick Chinese accent, the kind that Russel Peters imitates.)

Anyway, other than school, I have been trying, unsuccessfully, to get things back on track with PLB. I knew a month-long break at the start of a (potential) relationship would be hazardous, and I was completely right.
Actually, it’s more my fault that his. Ever since we came back from the holidays, I have been really awkward around him. It’s not like I want to be, but I just get really nervous around him, because now we are both fairly aware that we like each other¹. He was in my first class when I came back, and I didn’t prepare myself at all for that, so I barely acknowledged him there and left right after class. The second morning (we had the same class again), he did come over to talk to me, but I wasn’t really helping the conversation and avoided his eyes the whole time. The same sort of thing happened over and over again as we ran into each other over the next few days; I would be too nervous to flirt or say something remotely interesting, even if I told myself not to freeze up.
I was hopeless, and my awkwardness was going to ruin this!

Last night, I decided to try to redeem myself. I was going to Zee’s going-away party², and afterward, DG and I were going to The Club (the club that The Business School students go to every Thursday night). He was going to be there, that much I knew. So I drank, a little bit more and a little bit faster than normal, at the going-away party, so I was sufficiently drunk (but not sloppy) by the time we got to The Club. He was one of the first people we ran into, but it was in passing so I didn’t get to talk to him. The rest of the night I spent switching between the dance floor and the table where he was sitting. But every time I went to their table, some guy I knew would spot me and come over to talk to me. Many of them were my classmates from last year, so we’d always be very excited to see each other (one guy even picked me up and twirled me around – he’s really strong). I don’t know how it looked to PLB, that every time I sat down, a new guy would come to the table. Somehow, I wasn’t sure the jealousy card was a viable strategy for me at that point. In between guys, I tried to have a conversation with him, but it was hard with the loud music. I did find it more easy to talk to him, and flirt, now that I had lost my nervousness. But still, he did not make a move.

DG got frustrated and decided that I needed to redeem my self-respect, so she dragged me away from him for nearly an hour. When we went to the washroom, we ran into him at coat-check. He was leaving?!
I waited outside the washroom for DG so that he would have an opportunity to talk to me. He did come over, explaining how he had an interview the next day so he didn’t want to party too hard tonight. Understandable, but I was still disappointed. We hugged a couple times, but he seemed no more interested in me than any other guy I’d seen that night.

DG was more upset that PLB left than I was. “What the hell is wrong with him?” She shouted, a little too loudly. A guy nearby overheard us and said, “Forget him. I would never ditch a girl like you.” I rolled my eyes as a signal for him to move on³. Why was it that, today of all days, when the last thing I felt like was hooking up with a random guy, guys would hit on me so aggressively? Even the cab driver had offered to go out with me to “make that guy jealous.” (Yeah, I was pretty creeped out. I mean, obviously cab drivers eavesdrop, but isn’t it a cardinal rule to pretend not to be able to hear the passengers? Much less getting yourself involved and hitting on a girl at least ten years your junior?)
“Come on, let’s go get you a guy,” DG said as she dragged me to the dance floor.
“But I don’t want a guy,” I whined, although I didn’t think she heard me.

In the end, DG found a guy, and I went home alone. Am I really that pathetic? I guess I am.

1. God, I hope so. Because if I’m just making things up in my head again, I am going to feel like a huge fool.
2. She’s going to Australia for medical school at the end of the week.
3. Later, that guy found me on the dance floor and I literally had to push him away and tell him, “I don’t want to dance with you!” before he got the message.