Hello everyone. After what has been far too long, I am finally able to get back to you all with an update. If you were born on a farm somewhere and have no idea what this update is about, perhaps you should check out the original thread over here:
http://agora.rpgclassics.com/showthread.php?30779-Help-zeppelin-Chinese-Internet-Dating&highlight=
It’s been nearly a year since I made that first thread. A lot of things have changed happened since then. Unfortunately, rather than the project ending in a deep human tragedy for all parties involved like I hoped, it kind of petered out into nothingness. I discovered the complexities of Chinese internet dating culture are a lot more um…complex…then I originally imagined. I never even got a single date out of the project. Then some stuff happened, and I got a new job, whisked away a thousand miles away from Shanghai to settle into a new land.
Well, anyway, allow me to introduce Molly.
Upon first glance, she appeared to be your average Chinese university girl. Dyed “blonde” hair, baseball cap, awkward fashion sense, stockings with too-short shorts. Been there before. She seemed nice enough though. She is an English and Japanese Language major here in Dalian, where I am currently living. She ostensibly added me to her contact list (remember, the rules of the game I initially set out were that I wasn’t going to be the one to do the approaching. Part of the reason is a misplaced sense of pride I suppose. I expend way too much energy chasing girls in the real world as it is. If I get hooked on chasing down internet females, basically I wouldn’t have any life left. So I’d let them come to me and filter out the traffic.) in order to practice her English, which I was initially opposed to. I normally get a bad vibe from these kinds of girls. The last thing I want is some foreign-obsessed chick who’s gone through 8 other foreigners before putting her filthy clutches into me. But she seemed content enough to talk in Chinese with me as well.
Anyhow, not much happened for the first couple weeks. She’d occassionally message me and we’d talk about whatever boring stuff people who don’t know each other talk about: the weather in Dalian, what plans we had for the weekend, yadda yadda yadda. Well, somehow the topic of food came up, and I was telling her what some of my favorite chinese dishes are. One of them is a Szechuan-style stewed pork dish in a really spicy sauce, and when I asked her if she’d ever tried it before, she said no, because she doesn’t eat pork. “Doesn’t eat pork?” I wondered. “I’m a muslim” she said. WTF? Chinese muslim? Really? I knew that there were about 50 million muslims in China, but I thought all of them were of turkish descent. There are Chinese Halal restaurants in most cities in China, and the waiters and waitresses all look pretty distinctly turkish or Central Asian, not really Chinese. She said that she was part of the “Hui” minority group. So I did a bit of research. I’ll spare you the boring stuff and just let you read the wikipedia article instead:
So it seems there are actually about 10 million muslims of Chinese descent in China, which might seem like a lot, but when compared to the total population of China, they only comprise less than .1% of the total population. Most of them live in Western China as well, a long way from where I am, so I suppose it’s not too surprising I’ve never actually met a Chinese muslim. According to this article, for the most part they are indistinguishable from other Chinese in terms of appearance, so there you have it. About a million chinese muslims live in Eastern China now…most of them descend from families that came to the capital during the rule of the Khans about 700 years ago, when they held significant political influence at the court. That was a long time ago, and most of them just go about their business like normal Chinese people now. They do not speak their own language, nor is there any kind of “independence” movement, unlike among the turkish and central asian muslims, some of their protests you might have heard about in the last few years.
Needless to say, I was very intrigued when she told this about me. We started talking a lot more, one night even about two or three hours on the phone. I was very curious about her culture and background. She does not pray to Mecca 5 times a day or anything like that. IT seems to me like a lot of Chinese muslims are muslim in the same sense most American Catholics are catholic, or Jews are Jewish. They go to church on major holidays, perhaps partake in a few traditions like Lent or Yom Kippur, and the rest of the time it’s all sinful modern life. She does occassionally go to the Mosque when she is back in her hometown, she does not eat pork or drink (though she says drinking has nothing to do with being muslim - her parents drink, she just doesn’t like it. I’d say a majority of chinese girls her age don’t drink or smoke anyway, so it’s not uncommon), she participates in Ramadan, and she has a Chinese language Koran but doesn’t really read it much. The best part about this is the food though.
Chinese muslim cuisine is by far my favorite cuisine that I’ve experienced over here. It’s an awesome amalgamation of Middle Eastern, Indian and Chinese cuisine into a smorgasborg of taste. Get ready for some awesome looking pictures.
This is Naan Bao Rou. It starts with a flat-bread on the bottom, then it’s covered in big chunks of lamb, tomatoes, potatoes and other veggies and spices then drowned in a spicy tomato sauce. This shit is heaven in your mouth.
This is Da Pan Ji. It translates to a big ass plate of chicken, and that’s what it is.
And there’s a lot more but I’m getting hungry just looking at this shit. So yeah, we went on our first date on Friday. She took me to a restaurant in Dalian that serves her peoples’ tradtional-style cuisine. It was awesome. The best part was when she said she can make it even better herself at home. That’s when I decided I wanted to marry her. No I’m just kidding about that part but it is true what they say: the key to a man’s heart is in the kitchen. So yeah, we talked for a couple hours and ate some bomb-ass food, then I had to take her back to her dorm cause it’s China and they’re insane and lock the doors at 10PM. She gave me a kiss on the cheek, and then we kept talking on the phone til about 1AM before both of us drifted off to sleep.
We have another date planned for Saturday. I was thinking about doing something more group-like, inviting some of my friends and her bringing some of her friends and going bowling. I’m gonna try to get her to take a picture on Saturday holding a sign saying “Herro lpgcrassics” - now is your chance for fun times. Any questions you guys have for a chinese muslim girl? I’ll be glad to ask them, but nothing stupid and retarded like “hurrrrr what do you think of the communist party” - it’s a date not a fucking poli sci class. Also if you have any silly or harmless ideas I will be glad to try and integrate them into the date for all of your amusement.
