Speed Dating

So how did I go from the end of a nearly 7 month, long distance relationship to Speed Dating? Well, here's the story.

I am an avid hiker/trekker, and when I came back to Japan in April 2004, after living in Hong Kong for nearly a year, I wanted to join a hiking group so that I could make new friends and enjoy the mountains of Japan. I looked online for various groups, and ended up signing up to an English speaking hiking group that went trekking about once a month. I was really excited about going on an "international hike" for the first time in my own country, but unfortunately it pissed down with rain that day. Needless to say, the expedition was cancelled.

Ever since the day I signed up for the "international hike" I have been receiving a newsletter on "Events and Parties in and Around Tokyo" (which includes a hiking expedition at times. The title of the newsletter says it all: it's one of those "sad, singleton oriented" spam that has lists of events such as: "TGWR30s" (Thank God We Are 30s -- meet men and women (single/divorced) who are in their 30s!), or "International Friendship Party" (Tired of crowded bars? Tired of bad chat-up lines? Well, this is a casual get together of.....) , or "Tokyo Executives Wind-Down Sunday BBQ".... Do I need to continue?

I must admit I usually glance through the newsletter to see what kind of "Parties" are being organised in this city, when I noticed something new: "Speed Dating", a 5 minute date with 10 to 15 men on a saturday evening in a bar/club. There is a no-nonsense, non-threatening aspect about speed dating; if the date is not going well, and you don't particularly want to see him ever again, well, he has gone to his next date after 5 minutes, and "lo and behold" you have a new date for the next 5 minutes. And if that does not work out, well, you get your next dude in 5 mins. In all honesty, considering the calibre of available men in this city (you'd be surprised!) my expectation is that I am going to walk out of a Speed Date saying. "Yup. And that was that. So what can I do next for a laugh!"

So -- literally -- for a joke I applied for the Speed Dating thing, thinking that a) I probably won't get a place in the highly competitive event for all the sad and lonely singletons out there b) even if I did, it is going to be a laugh coz most of the participants are going to be geeks, misfits, closet homosexuals trying to convince themselves that they "can" be cured, or organic life forms that are a few, um, actually several steps below "homo sapiens" on the evolution ladder for there is no screening process to join c) it's a time-filler for me while the DWFs guzzle local booze in downtown Taipei coz they are out there for business... indefinitely d) it's boring being at home by yourself on a saturday night.

Two days ago I got a message in my inbox that told me that I had secured a place at the Speed Dating event on the 20th.

Great... GRFuckingEAT... (I really was hoping that I would not be accepted into this very exclusive club of sad, lonely singletons!) AND to just add icing to cake, or maybe salt to injury, the organisers had the audacity to say in the last line of the confirmation email: "By the way, is DWR a male, or a female name?"

These FECKERs don't even know if I am a man or a woman, and they are trying to match me up with a date!! I am a little bit worried now: I may end up finding a cabbage leaf sitting opposite me for 5 minutes during this Speed Date event, in which case I am going to have to snag its "1 free drink ticket". It won't notice, I'm sure!

Jeez, what have I done...

(post script: some of you may be wondering why I can just spring out from a 7 month relationship and enter the dating "ring" so soon. Well, to be honest, I am doing it to fill my time with activities so that I don't end up crying on the train again. My expectation, just as I said, is pretty low, and the most likely "ending" to the speed date story is that I bump into one of the closet homosexuals who dated one of my gay friends. Yes, it really is a small world....)