GIRLFRIEND #25
On Adult FriendFinder, I penned a regular series of blog posts about my girlfriends, including two wives - 16 out of 31 were covered. A further three girlfriends - girlfriend #8 (see https://bowandarrowman.
Girlfriend #25 shares a first name with the three famous women shown in the photos above and below.
I met girlfriend #25 when she was a postgraduate student - she was an international student from Japan. After she graduated, we started to hang out a bit together. She was keen to prolong her stay in Britain and was thinking of doing a PhD here. She sought my advice on how to apply for a PhD place here. My advice, if funding has been secured which it was in her case, to find the academic who has the most expertise in the proposed research topic regardless of what university they worked for. Here, PhD research, apart from a few research training classes at the start, is a lonely activity - it's just you and your supervisor. So, the choice of supervisor is critical.
Girlfriend #25 asked me whether I'd be interested in supervising her doctoral research. I was a little hesitant as though I had expertise in adult social care in Britain, I had very little knowledge of residential care for the elderly in Japan. As a compromise, I said to her that provided her research is comparative looking at both Britain and Japan and provided that she found another supervisor with some expertise in Japan's residential care system then I'd be happy to supervise her.
However, her proposed supervision plans had to be jettisoned after one time we met up at my house to discuss her PhD research proposal. After drafting a proposal, we ended up throwing scrunched-up bits of paper at each other. And before long, we ended up kissing. I grabbed her hand and led her to my bedroom upstairs.
I slowly, well I think it was slowly!, undressed her. She had a gorgeous body, and probably still has a gorgeous body. I coaxed her to lie on the bed while I kissed her body all over. I noticed that she had pubic hair, always a plus for me, but that her pubic hair was coarser than I had come across before. I believe that's the case with Asian and particularly East Asian women.
I then stood up and undressed in front of her still lying on the bed. For some reason, I asked her whether I could tie her up to the bed - not perhaps the smartest move when about to have sex for the first time! However, she was happy to be tied up. I got my Japanese bondage rope from a suitcase on top of my wardrobe (closet to my American friends), and I tied her wrists and ankles to each of the four corners of my bed. Obviously we had sex soon after.
We saw each other a couple of times a week and things were good. Girlfriend #25 redrafted her PhD research proposal just to focus on Japan, which I suspect is what she wanted all along. So maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to have sex with a potential PhD student!
New Year's Eve was coming up. Normally I'm not big on New Year's Eve, especially New Year's Eve parties drunkenly making out everyone you meet is a friend while drunkenly singing Auld Lang Syne. With girlfriend #25, I thought I could plan a New Year's Eve that both I and her could enjoy. I booked us into a luxury hotel in a nearby stately home for a five-course meal and fireworks with a bedroom to retire to after the celebrations. It turned out to be a very romantic evening for us both.
But a couple of weeks after New Year's Eve, and a few months into our relationship, I ended things between us. There were two reasons that were on my mind. First, she was a bit too submissive for me. Though I suspect this was a cultural thing, it started to bug me a little as girlfriend #25 rarely said to me what she wanted, it was all about what I wanted to do.
Second, and far more significant, were the language barriers between us. Though her English was good - and I always take my hat off to international students studying in a language that's not their first language, I was increasingly becoming aware that I couldn't talk to her as I wanted to. This was my far more than her problem problem as my Japanese language was non-existent beyond the obvious bonsai, geisha, kamikaze, manga, ninja, origami, samurai and sudoku words. Like a lot of Asian languages, the Japanese language, especially its writing, seems very difficult to learn for a European. I was okay at getting by in other European languages, particularly German, French and to a lesser extent Spanish, but the Japanese language was and still is totally alien to me. That was my problem, not girlfriend #25's problem.
It wasn't so much the use of words, her English vocabulary was brilliant. For me, it was the meaning of the words used. It was the informal cultural context within which formal words are used that made it difficult for us to communicate. There were two areas in particular that were problematic for us. First were feelings, and second was humour. Discussions about feelings for each other were always very formal. And any attempt at humour always failed - often humour doesn't travel well.
The language issue, in particular, was why the relationship with girlfriend #25 just ran out of steam. It wasn't going anywhere, at least in my book.
Have you ever dated someone whose first language wasn't your first language? If so, how did the relationship go?
Have you worked out the first name of girlfriend #25?
We kept in touch with each other when girlfriend #25 went back to Japan to live with her father. In one email, she said we had unfinished business. Though inclined to agree, I replied to say that we didn't have unfinished business.
In a later email, she said that she still had plans to do her PhD in Britain and that she was visiting Nottingham, where I was now living, and asked me to meet up with her. Though unaware of any Japanese residential care expert in the two universities of Nottingham, i agreed to meet up with her. She had booked herself into a luxury hotel, just two minutes walk from my apartment.
On meeting her in the hotel bar, she looked stunning - she was dressed to the nines as we say here. Though I hadn't brought my Japanese bondage rope with me, I deliberately decided not to metaphorically offer to tie her up with Japanese bondage rope. Tempting as it was, we didn't have sex that night. She retired to her hotel bedroom and I walked home.
This relationship with girlfriend #25, far more than any other relationship I've had, told me that language and in particular culture is a very important factor in whether a relationship works out or not. After all, it's no coincidence that the people we most get on with, whether sexually or romantically, just happen to speak the same language as us and just happen to live quite close to us!
I dated someone who was deaf but they could read lips and speak pretty well. But I have never dated anyone whose first language wasn’t English.
ReplyDeleteCommunication is huge for me, I need to be able to talk and understand the people I’m in intimate relationships with.
That said, I have a lot of local friends whose first language isn’t English and I appreciate their patience with me as well as them teaching me about their culture. The diversity of the neighborhood I live in brings me such joy.
My knowledge base when it comes to putting famous names to faces is very limited.
I too love living in multicultural and multilingual neighbourhood, though where I'm living now isn't that multicultural being an ex-mining town.
DeleteThis name is difficult unless you know your Japanese celebrities. It's Haruna.
I can not guess at all the name of your past girlfriend.I learned a few Japanese words and phrases when married to my ex but not enough to speak it fluently. My ex husband even with being half Japanese could not speak it fluently either. Outside of my ex I had not dated nor have had a relationship with any language barrier..
ReplyDeleteJapanese seems a very difficult language to master.
DeleteHaruna is her name. It was hard to know or even guess her name this time.
Nice name and hopefully on your next one, I shall be able to guess it..
DeleteYou have the best record here of getting the names right, so I have every confidence that you'll get the next one.
DeleteI'm fluent in both Japanese and English so speaking wasn't an issue. Communication isn't only about being able speak the language. There are too many who speak the same language but totally sux at communication.
ReplyDeleteThe Japanese society, in general, is still a patriarchy and women were taught to be subservient to get through life. Times have been slooooowly changing so the younger generation aren't as subservient.
I take your point that good communication is far more than sharing a language. It was increasingly frustrating, for both of us, that it became difficult or at least time-consuming to clearly communicate our thoughts to each other.
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