Shanghai Vixen

I’m missing a last minute chance to interview Roberto Cavalli during his Shanghai vacation - damn - but was already booked to head north on Thursday to cover a forum and a textile fair for both fashion publications. This means three or four articles, boring as shit, but a nice little windfall for this currently broke Vixen.

It also means I’ll have a chance to see my Cute Korean and engage in lots of repressed, virginal, itch-inducing flirtation. I’ve long since abandoned any hope of it going anywhere, and I’m less desperately horny post Biteable, so I can just enjoy his cuteness and his company without getting too frustrated. I hope. Anyhow, he’s a lovely guy I’m quite fond of, and even if he never puts out, perhaps he can introduce me to other cute Koreans who will…

I’ll be staying with Good Bug and Korean Ice - just back from their European tour - for two nights, then Cat for one. Always fun seeing the Jing crew.

Kellara’s in town, and will be in Beijing soon as well. Last night I bailed on my massive quantities of work to meet up with her and some of her former Shanghai High School colleagues for dinner - they dragged me all-you-can-eat Brazilian dead cow, of which I did not partake. Tonight I was supposed to join them for Japanese food, only they never followed up to say where they were going. As K’s got a European cell phone, I can’t call her, she has to call me, and I waited and waited and waited and she never did. Grr.

Just as well, her friends are quite annoying. There are people I’d only be friends with if met in Shanghai, and there are those I cannot be friends with because met in Shanghai. These are the latter. Despite being here for almost as long as I, they’ve learned minimal Chinese, and their interaction with local society has consisted of “fucking lots of those Chinese sluts”. Lovely. They enjoyed great hilarity over recalling the tale of the time their wacky Brit friend drunkenly raped his middle-aged ayi. After which he fired her. How cute.

One of these guys was once arrested and then exported from China, “Cos I objected to Chinese being racist!” says he. He was a high school teacher living in a dorm in 1999, and the Bao’an wouldn’t let them have local girls sleep over at the teacher dorm. (It was the same at my school in 1998, I remember creating distractions to smuggle Jifu in.) “They thought the girls were all prostitutes if they dated white guys!” And that’s changed, how, exactly? Sorry, most of youreaders are cool Chinese/Asian/Huaqiao girls with cool white boyfriends/husbands, but you know what the norm is. And, with this particular guy: he’s definitely paying. Anyhow, one night he came home drunk, was pissed off at the Bao’an for making him sign in, and decided to moon them. A real class act, this pudgy pinky.

His friend, an equally neon pink but nicely built American, has a pregnant wife, and went on and on about their conception problems. He explained, in a gratuitous tone, “Well, of course, she’s white, American,” as if expecting a sticker from us two white American girls. Yes, it’s okay to objectify and fuck the “Chinese sluts”, as long as you eventually settle down with “normal human”, aka white. Some of them know about Jifu, and apologetically refer to my “Chinese boyfriend”, with the implication that of course it was a youthful discretion and I’ll naturally return to the klan now.

“I think of it as channeling Oscar Wilde,” Kellara sighed. “He used to hang out with the working classes to see what they’d say. I likewise put up with these guys for the sake of the crazy crap they say.” Perhaps I am too sensitive, but white supremacy, women being all “bitches” and “sluts”, is really upsetting to be around. I spent the evening resisting the temptation to slam a broken beer bottle up one of their flabby pink asses. The thing is, these guys are otherwise nice, decent people, they just have these horrible, colonialist attitudes, in some of them mixed with heady quantities of misogyny. The melting pot of La Jolla and the PC politics of Brown did nothing to prepare me for shit like this. I know such shit is common among the neocolonialist expatriates I so avoid, but in avoiding I am rarely so exposed to it.

Not all whites are ayi-raping assholes. But a lot, to some extent, are. I hate that, by dint of skin tint, I am associated with such creeps. Truth is, most white people, and most non-natives in general (such as the huaqiao who date-raped, beat, hospitalized, VD-infected my Shanghainese friend who dated him), conduct themselves like total jerks. There is a reason it is growingly difficult to get a taxi while white in Shanghai. I don’t blame “racism”: I blame the white people here. 

It’s rather sad that I’m excited to be at 68 kg, but after hitting 72 during the US. 73 was the fattest I’ve ever been, back four years ago, but 72 now is a lot better because a lot of it is muscle. Size 12 four years ago; size 6 now. EXCEPT yesterday I managed to get back into my size 4 jeans again: yay! But there’s still a long way to go to the targetted 55…

Anyhow.

In high school, I was friends with a guy named John. He was cool and wierd, an artist who chain smoked even then, and joined me in entertainingly baiting our annoying AP English teacher. He was very different from my close friends in the Jewish/Taiwanese nerd brigade, but that made him interesting. A nice variation from the math and musicals jokes! I didn’t keep in touch with John, but when I was back in the US Kaoru bumped into him, he’s living at home, unemployed, total raving cokehead. Sad, he had a lot of potential.  She said he really, really wanted her to get him in touch with me, apparently he always had a big crush on me. Which I never noticed. I never do.

I thought of John last night because I bumped into an old rock scenster friend last night at a house party of this wacky Swedish couple. I actually had him totally mixed up with someone else, the bassist from Lanting, but, oops, no he’s one of the old Fudan/Tribesman/Hard Rock guys, an old friend of Jifu’s. Neither of us were much for mingling witht the primarily Scandinavian crowd, and so we chatted music for a long while. He was very obviously hitting on me, very touchy, and while I wasn’t going to go there, I admit my insecure little ego liked the attention. One reason I wouldn’t go there is he had the exact same strange distinct body odor that John had, and he kept wiping his nose. Yikes. We have our share of potheads in the music scene, but when did the hard stuff show up? One more example of the loss of innocence in this town. I miss 1998.

Friday I went to a party for the launch of the Versace Lambergini. It has got to be the ugliest car on the planet. Yes, nothing screams class like driving a million dollar giant cockroach. Still, eh, free champaigne. I took along Kazza, my Hongkonger curator friend who’s been gone since last September. Nice having her back. We’re both major enablers of our respective drinking habits, but she is a good one for long talks over free champaigne. We discussed men and family, and I ended up telling her the complex back stories about my brother and Jifu. As well as, on a lighter note, about a longstanding secret crush I have. Kazza, who has her own share of family and boy issues, albeit less dramatic - no one out drama-magnets Vixen! sigh - is very good at giving pep talks peppered with a gentle dose of “Stop moping, you silly dork!”

It was just what I needed. I need to slap out of it. Stressing out, feeling sorry for myself, letting the tears of self-pity accumulate in my stared-at navel, is not how I’ve gotten this far in life. And it’s not how I’m going to stay here or get further.

I went to a talk at the literary festival at M yesterday; I’m otherwise avoiding the event, since it and place are such pretentious expatria central, but yesterday was two Shanghainese writers I really like so I headed over. One I already know, the other I wanted to get her contact for a future interview. I was joined in doing so by two other foreigners, an eccentric bbc and an oddish older white American woman, both of whom rather competitively announced that they were writing books/articles on Shanghai culture, eyeing me cattily.

I don’t want to assume they’re phonies or fobs, but it’s telling that I’ve never seen any of them before at any other real “Shanghai culture” events, and I go to almost all of them, just at pretentious expatria central. The thing is, the people reading their articles or books won’t know that.

I remember when I was young, I was scared and desperate and lost, but I also had a hunger: to survive and to make something of myself. Now, I am too mellow, too lazy, too comfortable in my little rut. But, every day freshmen/fobs drop from the sky onto the Pudong shores, hungry for the life and position I have. If I am to keep those, and continue to improve them, I need to be just as hungry.

Sometimes I wonder if there’s something wrong with me.

Of course there is: I am in constant battle with genetics and personal history, being the only person from my “nuclear” family who is not manic-depressive, psychotic, schitzophrenic, anxiety disordered, obsessive compulsive, delusional, paranoid, and/or suicided.

Of course there is: I am fat, I drink too much, I am lazy and easily distracted. There is so much I could do, and so little I have actually done. Am I really all that “functional”?

I am so easily ripped between my American and Chinese worlds, and the transition has not become easier with time. Harder, actually. I spend hours per day alt-tabbing time wasting rather than writing articles or my book. I have the attention span of a hummingbird on crack.

I am poor and obscure and I am likely to stay that way, entirely because I am a drunken, lazy, frightened wanker.

I know I have it in me to write great things. I fear failure, I fear success as much. I write the book with the awkwardness of a virgin porn actress, deleting faster than I compose.

I look to the heavens and see my wall. Antique photos of Lu Xun and Henry Miller. A photo of my dead brother as a small child. My taekwondo green belt certificate. A wall calendar of modern Iran, shot by a photographer friend. My joke for Jifu painting of Mr Wonderful (our late feline child, how do I miss him) that is now my classic. Posters of friends’ pantings, travel collectibles…

Life feels quite lonely sometimes.

小徐来了! Xiao Xu is coming! Yay! So is Kellara! Yay!

Kellara’s my babe from Indiana who married a Swede, and they time split between Oxford, Amsterdam and Stockholm. She lived in Shanghai many years, is now doing a linguists PhD, and comes back about every spring. As the rest of you ex-Shanghailanders should.

Staying with Xiao Xu in Brooklyn was the second best part of my recent US trip. Number one was continued bonding with Camus, my cool lil doctor babe to be cousin and my top reason not to hate my gene pool. Two was bonding with Xiao Xu, long time casual friend and classmate I never knew very well before. Three was getting to know Joshua Xanadu, and he’d tie for two but I didn’t see that much of him. Four was visiting Happy, five was Jersey Girl. It was all great. Xiao Xu will be around for a while visiting her grandma, and we’re discussing taking some trips while she’s here.

I started out tonight at CreekArt, showing around visiting journos from the Independent in London and Vanity Fair in Italy. Londoner was cool but I kept getting her name wrong. Italian started out aloof but became nicer as I got to know her. I enjoy showing off for its own sake, but I hope to be quoted and even more to be commisioned by new clients. As if I weren’t already worked to death.

Then to Moganshan Lu, where we went to Shine’s show with its tacky collecion of drippy Mao paintings. Then up to Artsea for a much better show and crowd. We briefed another opening gallery, what Good Bug calls hanghua: kistchy oil paintings of minority women.

Island 6 was meh art wise, crowdwise was lots of young Euros. I met a friend of La Turqa’s from last night, and she introduced me around, including to an F. F is a white American artist from DC who’s lived in Europe for 14 years and is in the latest Shanghai Moca show. We got into a great discussion of politics, both of us originally intended that as our callings before getting distracted  into the arts. The usual conversation of Clinton versus Obama electibility, whether the American is more sexist than it is racist. F asked whether I still vote in the US, and at my affirmative he hugged me. He’s in the Hillary camp, saying she reminds him of his mom, who’s a lobbyist for Planned Parenthood. Cool guy; if only he were ten years younger, and, um, my type. Still, I enjoyed this encounter much more than last night’s flirtations.

I then headed to M on the Bund for a friend’s going away party, only it was such a packed house I barely saw her. Hung out instead with S, a Canadian gal who’s also been here for eight years and has spent those dating a Shanghainese DJ. Only met her recently, but we have a lot in common and a lot of fun when we meet up. Then, finally, to the grand reopening of Shuffle, renamed Pirates. It was crammed with 19-year-old French guys from Jiaotong and the DJ was loud beyond imagination. What sort of live bar opens without a live show? Not promising, not promising at all.

Upsetting though it was, and AWKward! the way it ended, the thing with Biteable was still a net positive. My long dry spell ended, I got well laid, and - most importantly - I finally rebounded from Jifu. After a long hiatus, the Vixen is back on the prowl. Mreow!

After Tuesday’s wallowage, Wednesday I had to go to cover an apparel fair. I hate trade fairs, although they’re easy money for brainless reportage. But, navigating one with a crying hangover, a nasty headache from grinding my teeth all night, and still a bit upset: fairly hellish. Then I got dragged into having a meeting with the publisher of a Chinese magazine that wants to arrange a partnership with one of my employers. It was a bit painful explaining: Look, freelancers generally don’t get to make corporate decisions at Conde Nast. Geez.

Thursday was the Aquascutum party at the Children’s Palace. I met Pierce Brosnan, he is very handsome. I enjoyed more meeting a handsome young Indian-Brit journo visiting for the event. I got some good flirting in, although I don’t think he’s in town long enough even for flingage.

Then last night was crazy. I went with La Turqa to a party at Xintiandi, the opening of their new apartment complex. Expensive and tacky, typically. But: the party was full of desperate men! So, that’s where all the single guys are in Shanghai: in property. The problem is that people in property are only a few steps up the dating food chain from English teachers. And about as interesting.

First up was a cute but nerdy Chinese guy in a sweater vest - at least it wasn’t argyle - who stared at me for a long time before coming over to talk. By the time he did, La Turqa and I were already being macked on by these two tall, young white boys from the American midwest, one beefy and one skinny. Both of them were fobs in Shanghai, and both were totally obsessed with my purse, a clear plastic number that was a gift from Dolce & Gabbana. Both of them at seperate points made the same dumb joke, “Hey, I can see through your purse!” Seriously, they both went on and on and on about my bloody purse. It was bizarre.

Sweater Vest joined us, and did the usual “Ooh! You can speak Chinese!!!!” routine. He had just moved to Shanghai from Dongbei, and was sweet but rather dull. We quickly ran out of conversation, but he determinedly followed me like a little puppy the rest of the night. 

La Turqa dragged me onto the dance floor, and soon she was being manhandled by Beefy. I danced with our melodramatic Italian friend Big Bean, and then he traded me for La Turqa and I was left in the massive paws of Beefy, who attempted to twirl but more like tossed me about. Skinny joined us, more friends came over so the paired dancing thankfully ended, and I grinned at Sweater Vest accross the room putting awkward moves on another cute white girl. Ah, the yang rou craving!

This went on for a while, with a few breaks for conversation and more wine, as La Turqa told Beefy his horoscope, she’s so Western Asian that way. Sweater Vest came over and tried awkwardly to dirty dance with me. So inept, it was cute. Then Beefy returned, told us he and Skinny were going. And then he grabbed me and kissed me. What the hell?!

Luckily he didn’t go for any tongue action, I was disconcerted enough as it was. La Turqa rushed over, cracking up, “Did he just kiss you?!” Well, points for trying…

With the competition departed, Sweater Vest became even more surgically attached to me. Awkward because I was trying to talk to friends, and his conversation skills aren’t much, especially in English, but he was cute and I was enjoying the attention. I would’ve given him a chance - except after a while he admitted that he still has a girlfriend back in Harbin, and is just looking for some side action/a new girlfriend before he dumps the old one. Sigh. Chinese men. This did not stop him from hinting whether he could come home with me, and I narrowly escaped my second kiss of the night.

Well, it was an interesting night.

Dear readers, we last saw Vixen’s handsome new love interest last December, the morning of her flight to the US and after their long night of athletic, intense and highly satisfactorily sex. After a long good-bye kiss, he rushed off to work and she off to the airport.

Okay, I can’t maintain the stylistic third person. As most of you know, he sent me a nice Merry Christmas email, I responded with a Western New Year greeting, both perky if uncommittal. Towards the end of the trip, I discovered his photo blog, and made an effort to reinvest emotionally, in part to steer my heart away from a particular tempting emotional precipice that some of you know about and I knew better than to indulge. I had no idea where we stood, we hadn’t exactly gotten to the relationship discussion before I left, for all I knew he could have lost interest and/or gotten involved with someone else. So, I emailed him a casual, “I found your blog, your puppy is very cute. (So are you What’s his name? I get back on 2/7, do you still want to see me? I still would like to see you…”

I thought that was good, if he’d lost interest or moved on, it gave him an easy out. But:  

He responded, immediately with “urgent” marker:

“Hi [Vixen], 收到你的信很高兴,他叫Oscar,长得很快,现在有3个半月了:)

我2月9号去泰国普吉岛晒太阳,去5天,可能会在那里碰到你美国的朋友;)回来后我们能见面!

祝你一切顺利! I was very happy to get your email, his name is Oscar, he’s growing up very fast, he’s now three months old. On 2/9 I go to Thailand to sunbath, maybe I’ll see your American friend there. After I get back we can meet up!”

I hmm-ed at this, positive but not exactly an “I can’t wait to see you” either.

After I got back, and was awaiting his return from Thailand, I saw a very cute stuffed animal Husky, and got it for him. I felt foolish for it, it’s rather dumb when an adult gives an adult a stuffed animal, but he’s very into his dog, and I always like having stuffed animals that look like my cats. 

The date of Biteable’s return to Shanghai came and went with no word from him, so I SMSed him “Happy New Year! How was Thailand?” He responded, “玩得开心, 谢谢 祝你猪年心想事成, 身体健康, 工作顺利, 万事如意! 我过几天发照片给你;-) I had fun, thank you. Here’s wishing you in the Year of the Pig your heart’s wishes, a healthy body, satisfying work, everything you desire! I’ll send you photos in a few days. ”

I answered him, “Thanks. I’d like to see your photos, and I’d also like to see you sometime”, and invited him to my holiday week party, which he did not show up at. I felt blown off already, but realized that Chunjie is family time, and tried not to take it personally. Then, last week, I already had plans to have Iski and Otter over for dinner on Tuesday night, so used that as an excuse to call Biteable up and invite him. He seemed glad to hear from me, said he’d come.

Then, Tuesday afternoon, he SMSed me: “你好小龙, 谢谢你的邀请, 但很    不巧今天公司比较忙, 晚上的时间不多, 我们过几天再碰面好吗? Hi Xiaolong, thank you for the invitation, but I’m very sorry today my company’s pretty busy, tonight I don’t have much time, is it okay if we meet up in a few days?” Blow off! But, the tone was very nice.

“Okay, no problem. Or you could come later, we’ll eat first and save some for you,” I responded.

“好:-) Great!”

“Does ‘Great!’ mean you’re coming later or we’ll meet up in a few days? I need to know how much to cook.”

“过几天吧 Let’s do in a few days.”

“Okay, but when? I look forward to seeing you, but I’m busy too, and I need to plan ahead.”

“我看一下;-) Let me check ;-)”

That was a week ago. I refrained from SMSing Biteable again, and tried to refrain from thinking about him/situation. I decided I would resume going to Taekwondo tomorrow, potential awkward and bad knee be damned. Tonight, like most nights, I was at the gym, and finished with my strength training I headed towards the elliptical machines for cardio. There he was, stretching in the adjacent area.

Our eyes met immediately, so I went over to say hi, fumbling with my Ipod. We made small talk, and I did not broach his AWOL-ness. His body language towards me remained unchangedly flirty: leaning in with a smile, his eyes sparkling searchingly into mine. Color me still confused.

I fled quickly to my half hour of cardio, blaring the catharsis of “Heroes del Silencio” while not getting much read of my George Orwell biography. I periodically glanced around, as much to keep him from startling me as to ogle him. Several times I caught him watching me smiling; or he caught me watching him, and smiled my way. Man, I enjoy watching him: not only is he the handsomest man I’ve ever fucked, he’s the hottest one I’ve ever seen. Mrrreow! 

Done with my workout, I went to the bathroom to buck up my nerves, then tried to nonchalantly accost him, only he was in the midst of a set on a machine, I failed to get his attention immediately, so I fled to the drinking fountain. I knew I couldn’t leave it there, but damn did I want to! I dragged myself, kicking and screaming, back over, plunked myself determinedly in front of him. 

“So, I’m off. Have a good workout. 你一直很忙吧? Still busy?”

He looked pointedly and awkwardly at the woman on the machine, pause, back at me. It was only then that I noticed her, an average to plain woman around our age, and realized they were together, the gym is pretty crowded at night.

“比较忙Fairly busy…哦Um…” Biteable tilted his head at the woman “我女朋友. My girlfriend.”

My brave face turned bright red and my expression dropped several stories, is currently heading for a vacation in Argentina. “Hi.” Now I hope I looked as confused and betrayed as I then felt, although at the time I was trying damn hard to contain it. “So, I guess this means we’re breaking up?” Cloudy suggests I should have asked. 

“[Vixen], J.” Biteable introduced. She smiled uncomfortably. I nodded and spat out another brusque “Hi.” Awkward pauses all around, until I broke in with, “那就这样了. 再见. Well, I guess that’s all. Good-bye.” And I left. I made it out of the gym, through grocery shopping, and to my door before I started to sob.

I expected this. Why am I so upset? Unless she predates me and he cheated with me, his only crime was in not telling me before, in leading me on with encouragement. I think…he genuinely does like and is fond of me, but met someone else when I was gone. As happens. But, it still sucks. And it sucks the more because this was my first real venture out of my shell since the Jifu heartbreak.  

Is there something inherently wrong with me? I am not such a strong woman after all, but I am self-sufficient and independent because since childhood I had to be to survive. I realize I’m a fat little troll, and getting old, and have a bad hairdo, but my love life sucked when I was young skinny and hot too.

I have friends who are good at and prefer the single life. I’m not like them. I prefer life as a couple, and crave life-long monogamy and kids and companionship. I needed to be single for a while after Jifu, but I’m so tired of it. And, yes, I got too emotionally invested in Wenyao too quickly because of both my loneliness and as salve for another recent heartbreak. 

I’m debating what to do with the toy husky. I think I’ll courier it to his office, with a note to the extent of, “I got this for you early on. I’m an idiot, huh? I don’t want to keep it and I don’t want to throw it away, so here you go.” I’m not sure if that would be too nice, or too immature. Since half the point is to make him feel horrible.

Well, I feel more horrible.