When you know he is the right one…

I start my new chapter in Shenzhen, China. I have lived in Yangshuo, Guangxi for 6 years. I had the best of times there and I had the worst of times. The best of times was when I met people from all over the world, some of them became really close friends. Even though they left China, I know that wherever we are in the world, we will stay in touch and will make an effort to see each other.
The worst of times is when I got hurt by men. I had a long relationship when I came to China, but because foreign men are popular with Chinese girls here, he left me for a Chinese. Also, once in China, we did everything together and from what I know now, we were not fit for each other anyway. I was alone for almost 2 years after that. I dated some guys, but it stayed with just a couple of first dates.
After that, I met a Chinese guy and we hit it off immediately. We had the same interests and we had a lot of fun together. Until more than 2 years into our relationship, I wanted to take it to another level. I wanted to marry him and wanted to have it more serious (after all, we had been living together for 2 years by then), but he became withdrawn and stayed out with friends more and more. Until I heard that he dated another girl. He broke my heart and it took more than a year to get over this relationship and to trust guys again.

Back in the single life, I also realized that Yangshuo was not the town for me anymore. It’s very touristic and it turned more and more into a party place for rich Guangdong people to come and party for the weekend. Although, I started to avoid the center of town and practiced tai chi by myself in quiet places, I started to feel very lonely as well. Most of the foreigners were still meeting in the bar. For me, I felt that chapter was closed. I wanted to move on with my life. I wanted to have more in life and not just a day job and hang out in the bar at night. I felt I was stuck there.

It took a while to know what I really wanted. Last year, 2014, I went to Belgium, my home country 2 times: in summer for the wedding of my brother and in winter to celebrate christmas (which I hadn’t celebrated in Belgium since I moved to China). Both times, I thought of moving back to Belgium. At least, there I had my family and still some close friends who know me for many years. Back in China, I thought if I would at least try to live in a big city, but the thought of starting all over in a big city where I hardly knew anyone, frightened me.

After thinking about all my possibilities, I returned to Yangshuo in January this year. With a new confidence and a brighter look onto life: I would go back to Belgium and find a job there. Even if Belgium wasn’t the country for me anymore, I could stay with my family for at least a year and in the future I could always move back to China. I felt I needed to be with the people I loved most.

But life gave me another direction…

Back in China I started to teach at my old school again, because I couldn’t move during the period of Chinese New Year and it would take a while to sort all my things out, not in the least my little dog, who I was planning on taking with me to Belgium.
At school, I met an interesting guy: Eric. We started dating and he showed me a whole different Yangshuo: he was into rock climbing (I had done it a couple of times, but because I never had friends who were really into it and because I was focusing more on tai chi, I never stuck to it). He always went climbing with many others: foreigners and Chinese. They were all really close with each other and I saw for the first time that there is something that binds climbers: they will help you with everything and encourage you to push your limits. We had the best times: we went camping a couple of times or we just made a fire near our climbing site and when we were not climbing we had great talks about life.
The Yangshuo I saw now, was one of being close to mountains, quiet spots, natural caves,… Not the hustle and bustle of the town. It made me look at it in a different new way. After 6 years, I looked with new eyes at the place I lived in for so long.

Still, I knew my life was not in Yangshuo anymore. Eric and I became a couple. He lives in Shenzhen, so after Chinese New Year, I moved with him to Shenzhen. We immediately lived with each other. I had to adjust to the life in a big city, but it was also very exciting and there are endless possibilities here.

In April, Eric went to Nepal to climb the Mt. Everest, which ended in a disaster because of the earthquake (see my previous blog entry). Because of this experience, I knew more than ever he is my perfect match and I never want to lose him. He felt the same way. So much so, that we got married yesterday.

June 5, 2015 is our official wedding day! It’s only by law, we will have our wedding party on a different day. It feels perfect!
When you know you have the right one, you don’t need to wait for a certain time to get married. It all goes natural and smooth…

I wish for everyone to find their perfect match and have a fulfilling life! Tell me about the time where you met your life partner or tell me about your past love experiences. 

New features

Hello everyone,

This has been my personal blog for a while now. I have written about my personal thoughts, my experiences and the personal development I went through. Especially, living in China.

My life has changed so much recently and I have decided to change my blog a bit. I will write about my life with my new Chinese boyfriend. Because I have moved with him to a big city, Shenzhen and we have our cultural differences, I will mainly write about our everyday life and our experiences.

My boyfriend is quite adventurous: he is into running marathons and ultraruns, mountaineering and rock climbing. I came to China to learn martial arts. My main focus in life were these sports. Read about what we are doing and if he can change my mind into following him more on his adventures.

I also have a health blog, which you can follow here: https://healthybodymindblog.wordpress.com/

Enjoy the reading and please feel free to comment on my articles and share your experiences in a foreign country.

Cultural differences

I started chatting with a Chinese man from Guangzhou and decided to stay in Guangzhou for a couple of days before travelling to Bali and Thailand.

I met him and we had a good time… sometimes, but sometimes I was really frustrated by him. I don’t know what it is with Chinese men, but sometimes they give you a great time and give you too much attention and a minute later they completely ignore you. Although, I know now that I think it must have been hard for him as well, because he must have been at a total loss with me too. It must have been so strange for him and doesn’t know how Westerners think and what they want or expect.

Let me start from us having a good time. He took me to a couple of nice dinners and asked me all the time what I wanted to do, which I really appreciated. He wanted to speak English, although my Chinese was much better than his English. So, I kept speaking Chinese, but there were a lot of silences between us, which was kind of ok.

The frustration began during the first day: he took me to a car exhibition and there I got really frustrated, because he was just walking 1 or 2 meters before me and never looked back to see if I followed. We lost each other a few times, because I wanted to take some pictures and I was too annoyed to call him each time, partly because there were a lot of people and I didn’t want to draw attention, partly because I felt he was not paying attention to me at all. At least, walk beside me sometimes, or look back from time to time.

After that day, I thought he was inconsiderate and that we had a language barrier and a big cultural gap. I was dreading the next day, because I still had a whole day there and I didn’t want to spend the whole day with him, but I didn’t know how to tell him without hurting his feelings. So, I didn’t know what to do, until, in the morning, my friend from Huizhou (the Chinese girl I stayed with when I was there) called me that she was unexpectedly in Guangzhou.

I called the guy that I would spend the afternoon with my friend and we had a great afternoon!! I told her my frustrations, but she told me that this can be quite normal in China. Even she walks behind a guy and never next to him (and she has studied in America, so I consider her quite open-minded). I already felt much better, but also realized that that man and I come from 2 different worlds.

When I called him in the late afternoon, he was a bit frustrated, because he had been waiting for my call all afternoon. He didn’t think I would stay out that long. Oops, now it was his turn to be annoyed with me. But, I also felt that I am not obliged to anything. I don’t need to hang out with him those 2 days. That’s also something very Chinese: they don’t let you free, even for 1 second. Because there was 1 situation that last evening. He took me to the Guangzhou tower and before going up, he needed to go to the bathroom. I didn’t have to go, so I told him I would wait, but less than 1 minute he was out of the bathroom again. The thought of me being alone out there, scared him and he didn’t want to go. Give me a break!! I am living alone in China, I travel all by myself to different countries and then, I couldn’t be alone in the Guangzhou tower for a couple of minutes? That goes beyond my comprehension!

This has been quite an experience. I understand that I couldn’t be angry at him, because for him it has to be difficult too. He wanted to give me a good time, but didn’t know what to do and he didn’t want to ask me (typically Chinese to stay quiet and not talk about feelings or something personal). I wonder now, if it’s really a good idea to still date a Chinese man. I understand the differences more and more, but I can’t live with them, I need a man who is at the same line of thought as me. My friends tell me that I will have to look for a Chinese man who studied abroad for a while, but even then, I think that most Chinese men come back to China and want to live by their own traditional values again.

I don’t know. Guess I am at a difficult path, because I want to stay in China, but all foreigners here fall in love with a Chinese girl and all the Chinese men are too different from me and my culture. 有点麻烦, as they say in Chinese 😛

Anyway, the Guangzhou guy can still be a friend. I know that for dating, we are not compatible, but I want to have more friends in China to understand more about the culture, if he can accept this of course…

Are there any other people who have an experience with a Chinese man. Please let me know, we can know from each other’s experience 😉