Here is the latest…
A new edition up on the Smashwords eBook website:
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/532806
One advantage of Smashwords is that you can download in multiple formats, and don’t need a Kindle account. There’s the direct PDF, as well as .ebub.
I can also do a coupon code to give free copies, if anyone is interested. Just ask!
Of course, reviews as always are appreciated (especially – sorry SW – on the Amazon link: Amazon.com/dp/B00RQQIA26)
The latest news on my eMemoir: “Pearl River Delta” available on Amazon’s KDP:
http://amazon.com/author/rayhecht
As readers should know by know, I have compiled together my Dating in China stories into a tell-all eMemoir. While you can read the blogs here for free, if you want to know even more to these stories and beyond then there’s a Kindle document for sale…
You can also read the eBook for free if you just ask, I’ll email it to you and a mere review on the Amazon link would be appreciated 🙂
The latest edition includes a bonus: the silent comic I drew last year. A friend recommended I add that, and I thought not a bad idea.
Previously posted here- https://rayhecht.com/2014/02/24/3/
I’d like to thank the very talented Jeridel Banks for the above design. The consensus is in, and pretty much everyone agrees this cover is much better than the one I did myself.
If you ever have any design or editing needs, please join Odesk.com and check out her profile: www.odesk.com/o/profiles/users/_~01a930cbc899bcc679
She comes highly recommended!
Ms. Banks’ writing can be found at at The Ends Don’t Tie with Bunny Rabbits via tiewithbunnyrabbits.com
DATING IN CHINA
(Table of Contents)
Firstly, from 2008 on:
Prologue: How I came to China
Part 1: Burning Man
I go to a big trippy festival
Part 2: Doing LSD at Burning Man
I expand my mind and receive an invite abroad
Introductions
Intro to Dating in China
First things first, let me explain how this thing will work
I arrive in China
The story officially begins, I get here
Girls
Mona
My first China-based girlfriend, and how that didn’t work out
Julia
The next level… Sigh, was it love?
Mary
A summer romance, a brief flight, all too innocent
Annie – Sky – Lulu – more
Singlehood, bachelor life, the learning process, playing the field…
Zoey
The Beginning
Long-term relationship begins, a defining point in my life
An American intermission
You can’t go ‘home’, and I try and I fail and I drift
The End
Finally, and sadly, nothing lasts forever
GUANGZHOU YEAR
In the city… the city of Canton…
And now, 2011 to early 2012:
My Guangzhou Year 1
An intro to the new status quo, as I pack up move to the ancient land of Canton/
the modern megacity of Guangzhou
Dating GZ Edition – Kendra
First story, I meet a crazed American abroad and adventured therein
Public nudity and disrespect, among other themes
China to Thailand to Cambodia
I travel, I bring a certain Cynthia, I make mistakes
But hey, that’s life and at least I got to see a new place
Dating – visitors and friends, others
Some characters from previous entries reappear, old friends reunite, a funny story happened one day
This time it’s not just about me
Rejected in Guangzhou
The stories everyone seems to want to know. Rejected!
Featuring Josephine, Seline, and more
The End – my humble successes
On a final positive note, sometimes life works out rather fine
It was a good year, I experienced a lot
I really shouldn’t complain
2012
Back to Shenzhen
In which I return to this town that somehow suits me
Emma
I begin the online game~
Jeanie
I have a girlfriend! I really did!
Yuki
I must admit, things got a tad gross.
Hope this wasn’t the beginning of a certain pattern…
2013: Epic Clusterfuck Year
Not Dating in America (and Hong Kong, and Canada)
2012 comes and goes and the world doesn’t end,
Meanwhile a bad start as I embark upon a year of drama bullshit
The Stalker
In which I make a foul choice which ends up following me around all year.
Dark times. No fun.
Carmen
I meet someone cool and travel to the Philippines
A brief positive note, albeit all too brief
Sonia – Jing – Amelia
POF, a site, met some peoples from differing lands, times are had,
and then I quit online dating forever more
The Very End
And I do mean it, the very very end.
I reflect and I consider and now it is time to move forward–
SZ
PREVIOUS MEGAPOSTS
Dating in China 1
From Burning Man to Shenzhen, covering mid-2008 to early 2011
My Guangzhou Year
In the city… the city of Canton…
2012
Back to Shenzhen
In which I return to this town that somehow suits me
Emma
I begin the online game~
Jeanie
I have a girlfriend! I really did!
Yuki
I must admit, things got a tad gross.
Hope this wasn’t the beginning of a certain pattern…
2013: Epic Clusterfuck Year
Not Dating in America (and Hong Kong, and Canada)
2012 comes and goes and the world doesn’t end,
Meanwhile a bad start as I embark upon a year of drama bullshit
The Stalker
In which I make a foul choice which ends up following me around all year.
Dark times. No fun.
Carmen
I meet someone cool and travel to the Philippines
A brief positive note, albeit all too brief
Sonia – Jing – Amelia
POF, a site, met some peoples from differing lands, times are had,
and then I quit online dating forever more
The Very End
And I do mean it, the very very end.
I reflect and I consider and now it is time to move forward–
Not to be continued.
–Thanks for the memories!!
Ray
A picture of me I took yesterday
2013, as I keep saying, was my Epic Clusterfuck Year.
Online dating, star-crossed romance, stalking, embarrassments abroad. I had it all.
Meanwhile, my so-called ‘career’ began to slowly take off. I published many an article, worked as a copy-editor, got a certain book deal. I moved, I moved again. All the while searching for that perfect match, and when the search availed I started again, with more baggage piling up and more losses to show for it.
It used to be that I did my thing, make the ol’ money and moderately exercise and read books and study, and I was more or less productive. I was prolific, and nobody in the world knew. Then this year came, it all escalated, I had no more time to myself, and I know my craft suffered for it.
In the end, I had very little to show. Very little to brag of indeed.
And yet, it got even worse. The story was far from over.
And yet, I will not continue this story.
I thank all you readers for being interested in my petty life, and for letting me share and purge. It’s been very therapeutic. I do hope it’s been a good read.
Unfortunately, we are now catching up to the present, and it is still too soon. It is getting a bit too real.
It’s awkward enough when I’ve written these things and someone out in real life tells me they remember that time. I shan’t do that anymore. I’m not out to expose secrets here; I’m obviously not completely into anonymity either, but I do have limits.
So that is that.
Allow me merely be reflective upon a memoir’s epilogue not yet written.
Wait a year or two or ten, and I may get back to you in more detail.
It’s a shame, it would have made for some great writing… Woulda’ been ten blogs worth at least…
Sigh: One. Her. Pejorative Nickname. I had a whole internal dialogue about what pseudonym or pronoun to use and what level of respect is accorded, and I will not share the conversation with you! Sorry.
Nevermind that.
Look. I know I’m not particularly innocent. I know I’m not.
But there was one day I lost the very last shreds of my innocence, and I can never ever get it back.
I heard things I never heard before, I was told things no one else has ever since told me.
That lasts.
I am, however, so over it.
I’m slightly better at relationships since that time. A little bit. A teensy, tiny, very little bit. But slightly better nonetheless.
A better class of person has graced my own personage, and know that it is appreciated.
I learned about all I could learn from the scenario. Okay? Okay?!! Okay.
At this point in my life I’d prefer to play it cool. Grow somewhat, take things seriously, and simultaneously be cool.
To get over myself, as it were.
Enough already with the self-indulgence.
It is 2014. In fact, 2014 is almost over. It is an even-numbered year, and I tend to do better in even-numbered years. It has been a year of much reflection and evolution, it truly has.
I hope I can keep it up.
Soon it will be another odd-numbered year, and it will be hard on me and I’ll need all the help I can get.
There are new challenges to consider, new stages in life and amazing things yet to occur. There will be novelty. There will be grace. There will be magic and fire and art and power.
Time to seize this living thing.
The dealing-with-my-issues stage is over. It is now time to go go go–
Wish me luck.
Thanks again for reading.
–Ray
We are definitely not at a loss for talent today, folks! A while back when I posted a Call to Writers, asking my fellow author bloggers to allow me to interview them, I was elated with the responses I received. (And if you would like to participate, please feel free to contact me.) I asked thirty-five questions and gave the interviewee the freedom to answer only what they wanted. My friend and fellow-blogger, Ray Hecht, had some wonderful responses which I’m sure you will find as fascinating as I did. When you’re done reading the interview, please hop on over to his blog and make sure you follow him for more pleasurable tales. And now, I present to you, Ray Hecht…
*.*.*
ABOUT YOU::
1. Please tell us your name (or pen name) and a little bit about yourself:
Hi I’m Ray Hecht, I’m an American writer of…
View original post 2,098 more words
Canton Tower
I was there, man
Previously: DATING IN CHINA – MEGAPOST 1
Covering the years 2008 – 2011
And now, 2011 to early 2012:
My Guangzhou Year 1
An intro to the new status quo, as I pack up move to the ancient land of Canton/the modern megacity of Guangzhou
Dating GZ Edition – Kendra
First story, I meet a crazed American abroad and adventured therein
Public nudity and disrespect, among other themes
Dating – China to Thailand to Cambodia
I travel, I bring a certain Cynthia, I make mistakes
But hey, that’s life and at least I got to see a new place
Dating – visitors and friends, others
Some characters from previous entries reappear, old friends reunite, a funny story happened one day
This time it’s not just about me
Rejected in Guangzhou
The stories everyone seems to want to know. Rejected!
Featuring Josephine, Seline, and more
The End – my humble successes
On a final positive note, sometimes life works out rather fine
It was a good year, I experienced a lot
I really shouldn’t complain
Stayin’ upbeat
And now for your reading enjoyment. In case you missed it before. Allow me to lay it all out.
Megapost of my personal dating memoirs, covering the time span of August, 2008 to February, 2011
Links, from the beginning:
Prologue: How I came to China
Part 1: Burning Man
I go to a big trippy festival
Part 2: Doing LSD at Burning Man
I expand my mind and receive an invite abroad
Introductions
Intro to Dating in China
First things first, let me explain how this thing will work
I arrive in China
The story officially begins, I get here
Girls
Mona
My first China-based girlfriend, and how that didn’t work out
Julia
The next level… Sigh, was it love?
Mary
A summer romance, a brief flight, all too innocent
Annie – Sky – Lulu – more
Singlehood, bachelor life, the learning process, playing the field…
Zoey
The Beginning
Long-term relationship begins, a defining point in my life
An American intermission
You can’t go ‘home’, and I try and I fail and I drift
The End
Finally, and sadly, nothing lasts forever
See end
Dating in China, blah blah. I’m coming to an endpoint here. At least the end of my Guangzhou Year point.
Yes, I was getting sick of GZ. But not sick of China yet, not even close. I decided to go back to the familiarity of another city, my default locale. Shenzhen is just where I would’ve ended up eventually anyway, might as well surrender to my destiny. I sincerely like it better, somehow it works for me. I can’t believe I’m still here.
Guangzhou, in all its overwhelming epicness, was a place to study and a place to learn yet not a place for permanence.
In this final installment of the Provincial Capital’s memories, let me be a bit more positive. I may have complained too much in previous entries; I should be more grateful for the wonderful experiences I’ve had. It wasn’t all lonely nights in Canton…
There was Nellie, whom I met on POF. She had an exotic face, a cutesy style, and she invited me to her glamorous home to drink French wine. I spent a weekend there, she was so gracious. Regaled with tales of work and travel.
She visited me in Shenzhen once too.
Then there was Janey, whom I met on gzstuff.com. It was all so natural and easy, she added me or I added her (who remembers at this point?) and I simply suggested we go on a date and then we did and it ended nicely.
She was very attractive, thoroughly modern, and studied yoga. She didn’t mind coming out all the way to my place. But oddly shy. Like open in some ways, so reserved in others. We went to the cinema several, and window-shopped at Tianhe malls.
One day we had a fight when I went to her area in Taojin. I got bad directions and got lost and was late. No dinner even, only harsh words. It simply wasn’t meant to be long-term.
Most of all, there was Valerie, my then friend-with-benefit of choice. An office worker in glasses with a casual style. She was from Yunnan. She lived in deep Panyu, far away from downtown, and she was happy to visit me. We first met at a market in Shiqiao, the busiest area of the district and a world away from the city center.
I took her to dinner, went to parks, we enjoyed many weekends together lounging about my area. She liked me, she really liked me. Always cool, always happy, always there for me. Such an awesome person.
And no drama. I thank her for this. Today, as I think back and compare, I could not be more grateful for her positivity and good times.
I hope she thinks well of me now. I don’t even know why we didn’t become boyfriend and girlfriend. Didn’t seem in the cards, didn’t seem we had that kind of thing going. She wasn’t really who I pictured myself with, to be honest. We never had any serious conversations. She never pressured me to take things further. She was perpetually chill. Who knows, perhaps something was going on in her personal life at the time.
Still, I wonder…
At local GZ pub, with olives. Gotta stay positive
Dating in China, blah blah. More often than not it was Rejected in China. Especially during my Guangzhou Year.
Everyone seemed to be doing fine hooking up, yet I always found myself to be wrought with challenges in this game.
People all assume that it’s so easy to be an expat in China. There are advantages to be sure, I admit my privilege. However, honestly I get rejected by local girls all the time.
What can I say? I really put myself out there. That means taking risks. That sometimes means embarrassing yourself, falling on the hard dirt face-first, and somehow finding the strength to do it all over again next weekend. Did I learn anything?
There was the girl who made out with me while my friend was visiting and texted me all the time, yet she would never make the time to meet one-on-one for a date. There was the second date with the Sandy when she slept over at my place and we massaged each other in the morning and then she told me she’s seeing someone else. There was the girl I approached outside in the street who turned out to run a bar in Panyu, and we as per usual made out in a club and then I went to her bar and I could never get her alone again. There was my cute Italian friend, one ambiguous friendship with that flirting tension in the air and nothing ever came of it. The American (from guess where, Florida) who was really into graphic cybersex with me and then by the time we met in person she was constantly talking about her new boyfriend. The Japanese language teacher friend who rejected my advances multiple times. The girl I met while backpacking in Tokyo, who liked me when we were chatting and showed me around in person but wouldn’t let me stay at her place during my travels. I even met a girl who owned a manga shop in Yuefu and I thought she just might be my soulmate, but she evidently thought there were no sparks at all; this was when I began formulating my theory that too much in common is not good for attraction.
Off the top of my head, two girls especially come to mind, of whose rejections were particularly hurtful–
Josephine
Josephine. I really liked her. Slim and glamorous. She knew her fashion. A French major, a Europhile. She was meant for greater things than me…
I met her at the big nightclub in Zhujiang New Town. She wore a sexy black dress. I used a great opening line about looking like a drug dealer and pretending people were asking me if I was holding, wondering what she thought of my looks. She laughed, we exchanged numbers.
We had pizza for dinner one day and I bought her a stuffed animal, and she started talking about her boyfriend.
“Isn’t this a date?” I forwardly asked, though trying not to come across as resentful.
“Um…”
I never did get a goodbye kiss from her.
I tried to stay friends with her.
Somehow, her number got lost as I upgraded phones throughout the seasons and I no longer have her contact info. It would be nice to know what she’s up to. Just to be friends on Wechat, see her posts occasionally, not bug her all the time or anything.
Josephine, are you out there?
Seline
Probably the most drama I had in my entire Guangzhou era was with Seline.
Now, I met her indirectly through Couchsurfing. But let me assure you that I never ever use the crucial travel-and-networking website as a hookup thing. That is strictly against my code. This was the only time I kinda-sorta broke that code.
GZ
In early 2011 I broke up with Zoey and I was depressed and I thought I should start Dating in China yet again. It didn’t go well. A full year with one person, despite the trying and failing at improprieties, and I was a tad out of practice.
A very significant chapter of my life had ended, and I knew it would take a lot of work to reach the next chapter of my life. I realized I needed a new start.
What did I really have in Shenzhen? Frankly, a bunch of shallow friendships and little job security. I liked my apartment and my general setup but I wasn’t tied down. If I wasn’t tied down, shouldn’t I take advantage and go somewhere new?
Many expats simply live out of their suitcases, but not me. The heaviest things I own are my books. I sell them, I give them away, but I always get new ones and I’m left with a big stack. That and my clothes and various knickknacks and toys, and it’s not as easy for to move to, say, Shanghai or Seoul or Bangkok as it is for that other kind of expat.
I made the decision to move to Guangzhou — also known as Canton — that third major city of China (a distant third, but third nonetheless). Why did I choose GZ? Several reasons. I liked the city. I planned to do more research of Guangdong Province for my writing projects. I even wanted to study Cantonese. Most of all, I wanted to get a van to pack up all my stuff and move somewhere only a few hours away because it’s easier.
I went there on a research trip and looked around and found a stable thing going, and I committed. Next there was the hassle of putting all my things in boxes, had a going-away bar-hopping party night with friends at the local lesbian bar, and 500 yuan later I moved. My Guangzhou year had begun.
Birthday video 2010, my life circa that era
Dating in China, Hooking Up in China, when does it become Having a Stable Girlfriend in China?
After much patience, it became.
I think I have a pretty nice story of how I met Zoey, as these things go. An average workday, I took an early-morning bus, sat next to her, and started reading my paperback of The Great Gatsby. Not my favorite novel, though I enjoyed the recent film, it was only a paperback I picked up because you can get classic novels in English cheap at local bookstores. It even had the Chinese name, 了不起的盖茨比. She saw it, and started asking me about the book. Cool! I’ll keep in touch with this chick. We discussed the Chinese title and how 了 throws me off because it can pronounced either ‘le’ or ‘liǎo’
We exchanged phone numbers. Later she told me that I looked so young, and she thought I was a college student. I don’t know if she took me seriously as a partner yet. In any case, she was more than willing to correspond with me and it was a start.
I wish I could say I approached her and it was love at first sight or something. I have a vague memory of trying to sit next to a good-looking girl on the bus – because don’t we all do that at times, just a harmless split-second preference – but I don’t usually try talking to every pretty girl I see, at least not without psyching myself up first. Besides, on cold approaches I wouldn’t even know if she speaks English or not. So, it’s a bit passive that she talked to me first, but I think I did well in talking to her back.
I didn’t know at the time that this girl would become one of the main women of my life, one of my deepest relationships. I didn’t know that I would stay with her all year and beyond.
Zoey was great. Very outgoing, very positive, not the shy type at all. Cantonese. Slim body type. Big smile. She changed her hair often. She had permed black hair when I first met her, then dyed it auburn, then straightened it, then cut it short and curled it. She was fashionable, not in the pricey wannabe way but in humble off-brand Chinese expressive sort, my kind of style.
She wasn’t very worldly. I know that she has since traveled abroad (I think she’s already emigrated, more on that later), but at this period she was fresh out of college working a trite office job and hadn’t been to Hong Kong yet. She was decent at English and we could communicate, but she wasn’t the super-fluent type. When I’d be distant and we would fight, she’d revert to Mandarin or Cantonese or even Hakka if she was really mad. We watched many movies together and I introduced her to a lot of my native pop culture. She was very open to learning more. She was a sweetheart, a perfect companion, exactly who I needed then and I didn’t even know it.
My dating in China continues, with the obvious next stage. Meeting a nice Chinese girl.
Backpacking summer ’09
It was a long, overwhelming summer. I haphazardly traveled to Shanghai plus Hangzhou to visit a Californian friend, I drank, I didn’t sleep, had to deal with high friends, had to deal with drunk acquaintances, had to deal with Californians visiting me and then getting their passports stolen. Then I moved, and I traveled some more.
All this and I was trying to put myself out there, but still mostly taking it slow with girls. (I made out with one girl at an epic club in Shanghai, that was it) After my “success” with a certain beautiful, sexy, glamorous adult woman, and subsequently discovering I really missed her, I suppose a part of me thought I should end up with someone completely different.
Mary was a girl, an English major at a university in Guangzhou. Junior or senior year, if I remember. 21 with medium-length hair and a very youthful vibe. I met her at a gig in Conghua, we hung out in my hotel room and played ping pong in the lobby. She very much had the cute thing going on. And she listened to Green Day.
After we crossed the threshold of fooling around, we vowed to keep in touch. Guangdong Province ain’t that big, and I needed to learn more about the capital megacity of Canton. Shenzhen is nice but that’s not all there is.
She proceeded to visit me, and I visited her. Actually she really made me feel better during the stressful days. We rotated visits every two weeks for a while. I enjoyed Guangzhou and having a bit of a guide. Go on weekend holidays, check out the Pearl River and the safari park. In a lot of ways GZ is better than SZ, it’s more massive and has a bigger scene and of course has more history and culture. Yet somehow the Special Economic Zone always suited me more. The Provincial Capital is too spread out, too much for me. Now, Shenzhen is a first-tier city and bigger than New York City and it’s not even one of the main big cities of China. Guangzhou may be a distant third to Beijing and Shanghai but it’s still incomprehensibly bigger than any Western city. I always thought of myself as a city person, but I must concede that places like Shanghai and Tokyo are way too much for me.
Ray-Comics 