So it’s a balmy Monday evening and I’ve popped out to the supermarket for a paper in my flip-flops and school shorts (shut up, they are damn comfortable and cost a small fortune so I’m going to milk all the wear out of them I can), respectably minding my own business as I walked back across the almost deserted shopping centre. “Excuse me,” says a moderately accented Asian voice. I turn around to find a bespectacled guy (mind you, they were the of the painfully hip chunky black-framed kind), late teens to early twenties, about a metre seventy-five, asking me for directions to the nearest “hair salon that’s open now which does the Chinese styles… not one of those western places”, I believe were his actual words. I cast an eye over his meticulously styled but mercifully undyed ‘do and then at my own dead-straight, original-coloured, unimaginatively cut locks which no sane person would consider to be the work of a professional hairdresser unless, unbeknownst to me, split ends have overnight become a revolutionary new method of layering.

Ummmm, I said to him, I think there’s a place down on Street X a block away from here. He looked completely lost so I pointed him in the direction of the train station and told him where to go from there. (Naturally I didn’t make any sense.) He considered it for a moment, looking thoroughly confused, then took out a notebook and a pen from his satchel. Are you in a hurry? “Here’s the train station,” I said, “and we’re right here.” I drew a squiggly line from one to the other which was absolutely no help whatsoever. Okay, he said, and appended my “map” with a diagram marked with the supermarket, Street X and three surrounding streets. Yeah, I said, pointing randomly to what I presumed to be the right street, it’s over there. Uh, he said, but isn’t that Street Y? Oh yeah! I said, thinking it a bit strange that he should be asking me for directions when he obviously had a better idea of where we were than I did.

As I was making to go, he asked me, do you use ICQ? Okay, I thought, an interesting turn of conversation. No, I replied. MSN? he asked. No, I replied. Oh, he said. An awkward pause as I stood politely, trying to find an excuse to move off slowly. Not even MSN? he asked. I attempted to launch into my long-winded explanation of why I do not use chat programs, gave up, and told him I don’t spend much time on the internet. (Ooooh, that’s a funny one.) So are you on holidays, he asked, just finished Year 12? College? Nope, I said. High school? he asked. Uh-huh, I said. He said really? I said yup. (Yup as in I’m revolving in a completely different orbit to you, so there’s no point even thinking about it, Buster.)

He asked me whether I liked swimming. Okay, I thought again, another interesting turn of conversation. By yourself? With your parents? Friends? he asked. Um, mostly with my friends, I said. (I think the correct answer was yes, with my boyfriend.) He asked me where I usually go swimming and I told him about the pool just a few blocks over, digging myself into a hole and realising that I should probably NEVER set foot in that place again. As I was edging away ever so slightly, I think he just asked me to go swimming with him. Holy shit, I thought. Actually, I think I’m going away on holiday pretty soon, I said. Wait, he said, can I have your… Your…? I asked back, thinking PLEASE don’t say phone number. Your… he said. Your… I said. “Your e-mail address?” Simultaneously breathing out a sigh of relief that I didn’t have to make up some baloney excuse about my phone being disconnected and heart sinking that I was about to give a total stranger my details, I jotted my e-mail address down in his notebook in my wonky left-handed writing. Yes, I gave him my real e-mail address. Just curious to see if he would do anything with it. And because I would have a massive uncalled for guilt trip if I gave him a fake one. Well, you know.

Can somebody please tell me what the hell that was?? Am I really so out of sync with reality that that was actually a quite acceptable and totally not out of the ordinary way to try to hook up with someone? On second thoughts, don’t answer that, I am willing to bet that within my not-very-wide spectrum of knowledge, many many people have gotten dates that way, and many many people will continue to do so in the undetermined future. Call me a romantic or a traditionalist if you will, but aren’t relationships at my age supposed to be born out of mutual trust and amicability, or at least a drunken snog at a party thrown by distant friends of a friend where there’s a chance that SOMEONE you know will actually know the person you are starting the relationship with? There is something inexplicably creepy about being chatted up by a total stranger who you have absolutely no attraction to. Which brings me to another thing: why is it that I get all these strange prepositions from random dudes I never would’ve expected, but never, not ONCE, nosiree, am I ever approached by a guy I might actually like? Which brings me to yet another thing: WHY AREN’T I ATTRACTED TO ASIAN GUYS???

Think about it, how much easier would my life be if I were? Asian Guy Wanting Hair Salon was moderately attractive, well-mannered and seemed perfectly nice (except for the fact that he was, oh I don’t know, TWENTY, but I really can’t blame him because I get asked by Amex hawkers whether I’m over twenty-one), and do I need to mention the various Asian homies, weedy Asian guys and Chris from ballroom dancing (who is not Asian but still falls under the category of Guys I Am Not Attracted To)? Should I just lower my standards? But girl, how much lower can they go? Granted, I am not desperate (no, just psycho) but is it too much to ask for a guy I can actually like more than a friend?

Gosh, is that it for me? Am I destined to spend the rest of my life chasing after the Completely Unsuitables and getting nowhere while being pursued by the Completely No Chemistries and also getting nowhere? What if the Real World full of People doesn’t actually exist and I never actually Find Someone?

How utterly scary is that?

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