It all started with a message from a dating site that I had long forgotten that I had left a listing. Somehow, even though some years had passed, a lady from Chongqing, China had dug through the many listings and found my profile. I almost missed the email announcing I had a message at the site through the deluge of 100's of messages I get daily. A little surprised that it had made it through my spam filters, I was curious enough to see why this person might be interested in myself, a hopelessly never married bachelor entering the prime of middle age.
What struck me first, was not her picture or profile (of which there was no picture, and little in the profile), was her simple but magical demeanor. Her command of the English language seemed to be that of an well learned scholar, but yet her expressions were somewhat lyrical, but not complex. What was in her profile, was interesting - we both disliked tatoos and body piercings, were both very interested in music and reading. She was very family oriented, another trait I was looking for in a relationship. I got the impression right away that she was someone I wanted to get to know better.
We continued forward with some short but cordial exchanges on the site, where we both eventually decided to swap real emails addresses and pictures, leaving the dating site far behind. In those messages, I continued to be amazed with her apparent command of the English language, as well as having a hard time believing her age, which was close enough to my own, given the pictures we exchanged. I was later a bit amused to find that she admitted to knowing very little English after my compliments, stating that the translation software she used through her email software was very good.
After months of exchanging emails daily, I finally decided to visit her in Chongqing....
