Reason 11 – they don’t always like to give as they receive

I was living in Tokyo, working for an IT company, and like most gaijins who don’t speak Japanese, didn’t meet very many Japanese men. Being six foot one and an African-American didn’t really help my plight with the less height-enhanced members of the Japanese male community. I would often find myself longing for even one sideways glance on the subway, instead of the furtive shuffling followed by the intense study of the stitching in their shoes, which is what I invariably received. On top of this, was the added slap to my ego that a large percentage of the foreign men living in Japan were chasing the petite, coy Japanese women – an understandable pastime but not necessarily a forgivable one.

One day, I was walking through Roppongi, when I met an Australian man – Reason 11, John. He seemed nice enough (although in hindsight perhaps I was so desperate to have any male attention at all – that despite his abruptness and often quite distant behaviour) we became lovers. We didn’t spend much time together, maybe only one or at the most two night a week, but we continued sleeping together for quite a while – meeting up in bars, having a few drinks and then returning to my apartment for sex. John would never stay the night, and I was never too concerned, assuming it was because of the distance he had to cover to make it home, rather than anything else untoward. We were fulfilling each other’s base needs.

At first, everything was okay, and I was under no delusions that our relationship was anything other than one based on lust and sex – really only to satisfy a physical desire we both had, probably because neither of us were getting any action elsewhere. The problem from my end, however, was that the sex just wasn’t that good. A few minutes of John’s frantic gasping as though he were in pain, a prod and a poke here and there and it was virtually all over. He was very fond of receiving oral sex but wasn’t exactly forthcoming in returning any favours I indulged him with.

One day, John and I were lying in bed, sharing a kiss before we were about to make love. We were both naked, and Reason 11 was lying on top of me, between my legs, kissing my neck. I thought it was an apt time to ask if he might perhaps give me a bit of oral pleasure and so whispered my request as seductively as I could.

I don’t know if I would have got a worse reaction if I had asked Reason John to sacrifice his first-born child. He stopped kissing me, got out of bed and pulled on his clothes while looking at me with a look of absolute loathing and disgust. I was so shocked (appalled?) by his actions that the only thing I could do was pull the bed-sheet up to my chin and stare amazedly at him, as he hurriedly searched for strewn shoes and socks. As he rushed to slam the door shut behind him, the last thing he called back to me over his shoulder was, “You are disgusting. What the hell do you think this is?”

When I recovered from the shock, all I could do was laugh.

(*It was only later that I discovered that for the duration of our affair, John had been married. I guess I wasn’t too shocked by this until I found out the reason for his divorce. John’s wife had discovered the equivalent of thousands and thousands of dollars missing from their bank accounts. It turned out that our boy had a severe addiction to prostitutes. Funnily enough, I didn’t date any other men for the rest of my stint in Japan.)

Reason 10 – because if you can’t beat them..

I was travelling in Thailand and was at one of the temples in Bangkok where I spied a gorgeous man. He had dark hair, coffee coloured skin and the most beautiful face I had ever seen. I watched as he pulled off a T-shirt and put on another one, taking note of his smooth, toned chest and abs. He was heavenly. And he walked away into the throngs before I could follow/approach/anything.

Later that night, in a bar on the dubious Koh San Road, I couldn’t believe my luck when I saw “the gorgeous one” sitting at a table on his own. He was reading a book, and I noticed that it wasn’t in English. Fuelled with the feeling of impunity one gets from being away from home (alone) and a few Thai whiskeys, I approached his table. “Hi,” I said, “I saw you at the temple today. Are you on your own? I’m with some friends back there if you would like to join us?”

The gorgeous one smiled a very polite smile and said, in perfect English, “Thanks. I’ve actually just ordered some food. But maybe after I’ve eaten.”

I wasn’t too impunity-ised to hear a plane crashing and burning at that exact moment. I smiled politely and walked away.

Imagine my surprise about a half an hour later, when the gorgeous one approached my table. “Hi,” he said, “Is it ok if I sit down?”

I almost fell off my chair.

The gorgeous one, reason 10, and I chatted for hours. He was hilarious – as well as charming, lovely, politically correct, Dutch and wonderful. It took me a few more drinks to work up the Dutch courage (heh, heh) to ask this gorgeous man about anyone special in his life. That was when he told me about how he and his partner of 4 years, Mike, had just bought a house together. Mike? A man? Gay? What? How had I missed the signs for that one? My gaydar was normally finely honed but in this instance had totally let me down.

That didn’t stop reason 10 and I continuing to travel throughout Thailand together and actually becoming very good friends (to this day). And he is still, 6 years later, living with Mike.

Reason 9 – because sometimes you only want them for one night, and they can’t even give you that

After being the recipient of surely the most, heartless, unceremonious dumping technique ever invented by cruel mankind (text-tastic Reason 8), I set off on a mission. To get as hideously drunk as possible, and to do so in as short a time as possible. My good friend chardonnay assisted in this task as well as a few trustworthy girlfriends who assured me not to worry about my ex, Steve. After all, they reasoned, Steve was a good-for-nothing-nobody who would be regretting his decision in the very near future (NB: He didn’t, a friend told me he shacked up with the next woman he met and as far as I know, they are still together, but cè la vie). Besides, they reminded me, I was an empowered independent woman who could do a whole lot better. 

A whole lot better turned out to be just over on the other side of the bar, and so, aided wholly with Dutch courage (in this case in the form of nastily cheap house white wine) I grinned coyly, until he approached to introduce himself. His names was Steve, and while one may assume that I would have laughed ironically and turned on my wobbly heel at the very point his name slipped past his lips, I didn’t. No, actually I spoke to him for about a good ew hours, before he suggested we “go back to mine for coffee”. And he meant mine, not his. And I know he didn’t really mean coffee. But, having just painfully finished (or had finished) an eighteen month relationship, and having never experienced a “one-night stand” before at the age of 34, AND having three girl friends nod and wink surreptitiously as I gave them a querulous look, I agreed. And we left. Back to mine.

And so it goes. Steve and I were kissing at the door, my blood and the wine that accompanied it was racing and sure enough, surprise, surprise, we ended up in bed, making mad, passionate, drunken love. He was an energetic lover, and the fifteen or so minutes he lasted were sweaty, sexy and somewhat satisfying. Afterwards, as I lay back contemplating whether this was the best I was going to get from here on in, Reason 9 leaned over and whispered gently into my ear, “just so you know, I can’t stay tonight”.

I sat up on one elbow, looked into his eyes and asked, “why not?”

“I have to get home,” he whispered, “my wife needs the car to take the kids to Sunday school in the morning.”            

Nonetheless, Reason 9, has put me off of men of the name Steve for eternity, although the sight of him naked, with all of his clothes in his arms or on the floor of the elevator around him as he begged to be let back in to the house to at least get dressed was memorable… and rather sobering.

Reason 8 – they rely on SMS-ing too much

I had been in a relationship with Reason 8, Steve, for about twelve months and we had gotten along famously right from the very beginning. As soon as I had met him I had realised that he had the potential to be the perfect guy. He could cook. He could clean. He was witty and charming and active and damn it, he was great in bed. I had always been an extremely independent woman and both friends and family were amazed that I seemed to be committed to this one guy – something they had long lost hope of seeing, particularly as I was nearing my mid-thirties and had never been in a relationship longer than a few months before getting itchy feet and wandering eyes.

A year or so into our relationship, I decided it would be a natural progression for Steve and I to move in together (in hindsight, possibly my first major error). It wasn’t something that I was overly concerned about – I wasn’t intent on invading anyone’s personal space, or inviting myself into facets of Steve’s life in which I wasn’t welcome… No, no. It just made perfect sense to my practical self that since we spent all of our time together anyway, in either his house or mine, we may well pool our resources, cut our expenditure and streamline our operations. We could consider the whole episode a business venture between two like-minded individuals who enjoyed each other’s company. Yes. A business venture.

After a few weeks of discussion, I realised that Steve wasn’t in any way ready to be moved in with. I suggested that we postpone (indefinitely) our co-habitation, and all discussion about it, and Steve hastily and eagerly agreed. The dialogue was shelved and our relationship continued along the happy trail it had been coursing. We returned to spending two or three nights a week at each other’s houses and being inseparable between Friday nights and Sunday evenings. I had my much-loved solitude a few nights during the week and the taboo subject of living together was never discussed.

A further six months later, around the 18 month mark in our relationship, Steve decided to broach the topic of living together again. He explained that he hadn’t been ready previously, but had reconciled that my proposal had been correct purely from an economic viewpoint, and that in order to streamline operations, we should try living together. I nodded as he said this and explained that I didn’t want him to feel pressured into doing anything as I was more than happy with they way things were (“and if it ain’t broke, why fix it?”).

“No, no,” argued the fellow pragmatist Reason 8 - he felt it was in both of our interests to look at it as a business venture and move in together as a cost-saving initiative. I think he even thought that this was his idea. I explained that I enjoyed things the way they were, but if he really felt strongly about it, I would be prepared to remove some of the clutter in my house for him to have some space for his own clutter. He could move in at the end of a month when the notice on his own apartment ran out.

So, I spent the following month clearing the spare room to create space for my soon-to-be live-in-lover. Steve seemed to be often busy in the fortnight preceding the move, explaining that he couldn’t see me most nights because it was taking him so long to pack up his many possessions – he didn’t seem to want any assistance either. I really thought nothing of it, reconciling that I would be seeing more than enough of him before too long and revelling in the lone-time I was able to enjoy.

The daySteve was due to move in, I hadn’t seen him for 10 days, although we had been speaking often on the phone, and sending text messages constantly (we were a couple of the new millennium after all – it was all about the text messages from start to finish).

I called him in the morning and he said that he was on his way over with a truckload of furniture and car full of clothing.

I never saw or heard from Steve again. Except the text message I got after leaving a few messages asking where he was. “Sorry babe. Can’t do this. Need space. CUO (“See you round”) Steve x”. So much for our adult, mature business proposal. The whole 18 month partnership was over with a single text. Steve never returned my calls or emails, and one day I came home to find all of my belongings that had resided at his house in a carton in my apartments foyer. For all I know he could have been dead. I didn’t ever get up the gumption to send him my ideal (not-very-mature) text back: FU U 8=9 (“Fuck you, you knob”) J

Reason 7 – sometimes they need no explanation

This one is enough to turn any woman off men for life – with a few PerezHilton embellishments of course!