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Take Caution When 'dating' Chinese Girls

By Peter Chambers


Perhaps you have 'dated' Chinese girls before? You may have taken them out on a 'date' or maybe several 'dates' only to be spurned in your advances. You probably paid for a few nice meals and spent considerable time with them, thinking that things were going very well. Obviously she must like you a lot if she went out with you so many times! So then you try to kiss her and get hit with bitter rejection. That's because your 'date' was more like an appointment.

The term date in Chinese literally means a consultation. Many times, it has no romantic connotation whatsoever. From MDBG.net (fantastic Chinese dictionary site), the word ??yue?hu means "appointment / engagement / date ... / to set up to meet." It simply means an arrangement to meet. The same word you make use of to question a woman out is how she asks her dentist to meet her for a cleaning!

Don't be surprised if she conveniently twists the context of this word to her advantage. The term itself serves to safeguard Chinese girls' interests. If you take them on a few dates and she decides there is no sexual/romantic connection there then she simply says she never imagined there was any romantic implication! This could lead you to ask, "Well how come she dating me if she didn't have any interest?"

This is where "face" comes into the discussion.

If you know much about Chinese culture, you have certainly have come across face before. Chinese girls believe that by merely being with you they are offering you face. Just by being out in public together with her she is doing you a service. This has a strong reference to a previous article I wrote about Chinese girls possessing a sense of entitlement. Only a Chinese girl supply you with face, not the opposite way round.

The reason this causes this kind of dilemma is because Chinese girls maintain this mentality when they come over to the USA. It may take them over a year before they fully grasp the idea of "dating" in English. Obviously in the event you ask a girl on a date in English there is a romantic implication there, but it will take a Chinese girl some time to realize this. The way to combat this issue is to simply be honest with her and after a few "dates" make it clear that you've got romantic feelings and prevent getting the run around.

It is important to recognize that this isn't an isolated phenomenon. Translation can cause issues and you need to be careful of the language you choose so as to make your speech concise and clear. You have to be aware of simple things like calling a lady funny signifies that she is humorous in English, but in Chinese means weird or irregular. It is not easy to identify these complaints and not using a little bit of research so go out there and learn some Chinese for yourself!




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