Back in September 2017 (I know my posts are super delayed, I’m living life which is a good thing right!?) I met someone off Tinder. Ah yes, the infamous app that’s spawned (hundreds of) thousands of bad date stories. When you match on the app, it’s the instant rush it’s the instant rush of dopamine, especially if they’re cute and actually bothered to fill in their profile. He had:
- written a few interesting lines in his bio (check),
- no selfies with drugged up tigers (check),
- no shirtless gym/lift/bathroom pictures (check),
- no selfies from the awful upward angle (i.e. looking up their nose and double chin) (check)
- smiling without looking creepy (check).
It was looking up.
He was a new transplant to the country, originally from Nepal, grew up in Singapore and spent the last few years in the United States, before moving to Melbourne for 6 months, then most recently Sydney 5 months ago. We texted for about a week, before he took the plunge and asked to meet for an afterwork coffee. I already had plans on that Monday night, so we took a raincheck for Thursday night instead for 6.30pm. Now, 6.30pm is kind of an awkward time. A bit too late for just a drink, ‘cos it’s edging towards dinner time.
I have an unspoken rule, never to do dinner for a first date. It just brings up all these fears you’ve over committed a big time slot to someone you don’t even know. What if, within the first 10 minutes you realise it was a bad decision and regret promising dinner with someone that could last 1-2 hours?! Even though I expressly asked him, if he was sure about dinner and even expressly joked (not really joked) about how it might be awkward, he laughed it off and insisted it would be ok. So at least that gave me confidence, he had confidence we could survive a first date dinner. So we had settled on a date and time, then another text came…
To give you a heads up, I’m actually 164cm… if you don’t want to meet up I’d understand.
Now I’m no giant at 170cm. So if I turned down the date at this point, I’d be a heightist… and of course since we had been in a text conversation, I had mere minutes to craft a response back ASAP. So I thought: OK, fuck it. How bad could it be? What is height anyways?! So I texted back, saying it’s fine and he joked, that he would wear high heels. (Not a funny joke.)
It was a Thursday night, and we were meeting outside Wynward Station. I got there on time and before him and luckily he did turn up and the height difference wasn’t that noticeable.
We hadn’t decided on any specific restaurant, but seeing as he was new to Sydney, I made an executive decision to go to Barangaroo. After walking around we eventually chose Vietnamese – Pho mo. We ordered the banquet (which was way too much food). The food was decent and the conversation was surprisingly easy (without needing to resort to a lot of alcohol! I only had 1!) Then suddenly during the meal, he asks: “What are you looking for? Talk about being put directly on the spot!
This is a Tinder date! Who asks such a question on the first date?! I hadn’t anticipated this question to come up at all, as I thought just the usual blah blah questions like job/hobbies/travel stuff would come up.
“I’m looking to meet new people…?”
I turned the question back on him and he: “recently remembered the app and used it because (I) was bored.” Super not flattering reason. Um. Thanks. Not.
So I brushed this off as just nerves or a massive brain fart and surprisingly after this (I do not know how the conversation could’ve recovered after that), but the dinner continued on and was actually, dare I say fun? He insisted on paying, despite my insistence on going halves at least. It was still kinda early in the night when we finished eating, so he suggested going for a walk along darling harbour and since we were walking anyways, I suggested that I’d shout him ice cream at Messina in The Star, seeing as he’d never tried it before. Yummos! Walking around with our ice creams, we got onto the topic of food and he asked what were some must-eats in Sydney. We happened to walk by Adriano Zumbo, so I said: macarons! He had never even heard of macarons before.
Where had this guy been living, under a rock?!
To deflower his macaron-noobness, I bought him and I some to nibble on. Then continued to walk around the Star for a bit, before he suggested sitting down in one of the lounges to listen to the live band. He had gone up to get a drink (and I had declined another) and by the time he came back, the band wrapped up their set. Ha! So we stayed at the lounge until he finished his drink and he mentioned that he liked photography and showed me one of his favourite shots. So I’m looking at the picture, it’s a scenic one of snow capped mountains in the background, where he’s doing one of those ‘hero poses’ with his back to the camera looking over the horizon. “Ah cool…” I said casually, then I saw something you can’t un-see.
It was a picture of him, sitting on an outside toilet in a hero pose where you could see a peek of his butt crack with his back to the camera looking over the horizon. “Hold on! You’re taking a shit outside!” “HAHAHA, yeah! “Er wha…?
Just as he finished his drink, I asked him for the time and as it was approaching 10pm we decided to walk back to the train station to call it a night. We stood awkwardly at the station, facing one another as we were traveling in opposite directions. It’s that moment, where you don’t know if they’re going to lean in for a kiss, hug, wave or handshake even. Luckily he broke the silence and said he had a great time. “Me too.” Him: “I’ll text you to see you again?” Me: “Sure. Night.” Him: “Night!” We waved goodbye awkwardly.
