Back to the USSR

It really is true: the minute you swear off men and dating forever, a really good prospect arrives on the scene.

The scene: after several smaller and one large heartbreak(s), our heroine has decided that dating in Asia just isn't cutting it. Reasons:

1) Local men are generally either already married or in a serious relationship, and if they aren't, there's a damn good reason why they're single.

2) Ex pats (American/ European) are here to date 18 year old, 4'9", 87 pound girls who speak almost no English and won't give them any lip when they play their iPod at dinner (seen it!).

3) "Other ex pats" (ie, Indians) have given me a million laughs, and a million headaches. (Enter Ant, who I broke up and got back together with about 4 times in 5 months). So they're out.

There's a lot of other reasons, but the big one:

4) I genuinely don't want a BF at this time-- it's a lot of work, trouble, and risk for something that may or may not work out. I see a serious relationship almost like a part time job, and since my full time job and my part time job of trying to f--ing make it in a 3rd world country without losing my mind keep me pretty occupied, I kind of gave up.

Well, I have a stable of "Chapsticks"-- eligible, friendly men (Haresh, Pree, etc) who can squire me around, and who look good in a sports coat and jeans; but who don't try to give me "the business" in their every spare moment. So my life isn't man- free, per se.

It was at Internations, with one of the aforementioned Chaps, that I met "him". I was sitting on a bench with Preetam, who is a magnet for other people (I can choose my Chaps- everyone I've brought to Internations is one of those naturally attractive souls that radiates good will) and this cheerful, pudgy dude comes up.

This is Anuj, who looks like Pooh Bear with a tan and glasses. Anuj is holding forth on business (pretty much the only topic Indians want to talk about, other than the quality of women they see, have known, or are about to hit on), and Pree is as happy as a cricket on the hearth. ( I sold him on going to the event not by talking about the free wine, the hot white chicks, or the chance to get out of the house. Nope. I mentioned "It's a great chance to network." I had him at "network".)

Now, Anuj is part of a large group of men, who have arrived rather late in the game and are roaming around as a whole. He beckons them over and my mother is proven right (she pegged me as "surrounded by a group of men at any given party" in her fashion type quiz) as within a few minutes I'm swarmed by a group of *very interested* Indians, all trying to be cool, yet studly, all while being visibly torn between the prospect of hitting on a heretofore unknown white girl, and talking business with a heretofore unknown businessman.

Heh.

In the crowd is Allwyn. Allwyn makes no bones about his intentions and (wisely, as it later turns out), forgets all about trying to network and sits down next to me, chatting me up and getting my number. Allwyn has a significant leg up over the other men, as he has a lush, jet black Van Dyke goatee, which suits his face perfectly, and glasses, which gives him the air of being a very tan, hipster Dr. Freud. In contrast to his fashionable exterior, he is extremely earthy- you know those people you meet who are very human but somehow possess a very animal side as well? That's him. His family are coffee growers, and everything about him is warm and dark, like coffee.

In a very gratifying show of interest, Allwyn follows up later, while our two parties have gone our separate ways (him and his group to a club and me and mine to a speakeasy), and he invites me to join him at his club. I'm in the middle of a drawn out, intimate, candle lit discussion with Pree and Haresh about [something or other, this was about 5 cocktails into the night], and I have no intention of dropping everything to rush off to be with a guy I just met. So I offer up "recovery breakfast tomorrow?" He's in for the next day, but he's scheduled to do some damned volcano trek, so it will have to be dinner.

Well, the next day we meet up at 9 for dinner. We have dinner and coffee, then go back to my place to talk and only at 4am, do we reluctantly part ways, having talked through a movie that we finally just turned off to talk uninterrupted.
I had decided to just treat him as a friend, but keep the slightly flirtatious angle and rigorously check for red flags. Marriage/ kids minded? Nope. Into drugs/ heavy drinking? Nope. Sexist jerk? Nope. Local Yokel who has never been outside of his home town and the current location? This is someone who *voluntarily* went camping in Mongolia, people.

Anyway, long story short, he's boyfriend material. I've never really experienced something like this- the light hear-ted flow of talking to a friend, not walking that "don't say the wrong thing" tightrope while trying to read a man's mind and tell him what you think he wants to hear. And yet, I still felt a strong spark of chemistry with this guy, it wasn't like the "friend window" was now closed and we were suddenly dude bros.

So we met up for lunch a few days later, and then had after- work drinks on Sat night. So Sat night we had a little chat, where I really laid my cards on the table and spelled it out. "I'm theoretically OK with Friends Plus, but I have tried it and for me, it's just not going to work. If I'm going to be intimate with someone, it means something to me, and it doesn't have to be dead serious from Day One, but it has to be headed in the direction of commitment."

For me, I want a man who likes and respects me enough to say "I want her all for myself and long term." In general, and in my experience, when a man really likes a girl, he wants her all to himself and wants to make it serious. I've actually had men outright tell me (in the process of trying to date me) "I want you to be my GF!"

He told me (and I believe him) "I knew from talking to you that you weren't someone who plays around, and I asked for your number and asked you out knowing this. I can't be Mr. Romantic, texting you all the time and that, but I want to be with you, and I want to see what happens. And I don't want anyone else."

So that's it, I'm seeing him and while I won't say it's "serious", neither would I entertain offers from other men. He's a handful anyway.

 Basically, I've done a lot of thinking about this, and I have decided that for my purposes (a drama free life), it's either really just friends, or a traditional dating set up, where both of you are interested in finding a long term partner. I don't want to waste time "hooking up" with men who aren't quite right for me, and furthermore, having "question mark" men in my life leaves the field cluttered and crowded, shooing off quality men who are looking for a "girl who doesn't play around."

I have never had a man say that to me, which means that I have internalized this way of thinking and reorganized my life to the point where it's visible through my body language and my choice of words: "Serious Customers Only. No Looky- Loos." Nice.

We'll see. If it works out, great. But if for some reason it fizzles, of course I'll be disappointed but I won't be devastated, since it's really a plus, not a raison d'etre. And people, he's adorable.