Singapore

Wow what a weekend. Well actually it was roughly 40 hours. Though the effects lasted over a week.

A lot of you will know that early in my travels l rejoined the bachelor ranks, ending a four and a half year relationship. It was tough and something that travel has helped with immensely. However I didn't think that I would find myself dating for some time as I wanted to come to terms with the loss of an important part of my life and also rediscover myself, which I know sounds a bit gay, but you know what I mean.

This was my state of mind regarding relationships when I landed in Singapore. I had a week or so previously joined Tinder and Grindr out of curiosity and hungover boredom. Plus I realised I had been ragging on Grindr for being disgusting without actually knowing what I was talking about, which is a bit unforgivable in my book.

As with all social media apps, there is an instant addiction which lasts for a few days (Whisper) to several weeks (Instagram). This was true of both apps. While Tinder offered very little interaction because I never swiped left to "like" anyone, Grindr had the opposite problem, it's mental out there and I don't want to see some ananamous junk anytime, never mind before breakfast. I now know what I'm talking about when it comes to Grindr and I was right all along, although there are a lot more nice people on there than I expected, I even made a few friends, well two.

I digress... After a jam packed morning of sight seeing, which included having a Singapore Sling at Ruffles where it was created, I decided to stop for lunch at Marina Bay Sands and began to flick through Tinder. It was then that I saw the guy that I fell for. He's not out on social media and I don't want to name names, so let's call him Dave... While absent mindedly flicking through the app in a cafe I saw Dave's picture and was instantly blown away, he was no where near my type, but damn! So I gave a rare left swipe and was notified that Dave had already left swiped me. This was exciting and terrifying in equal measure, like what was I going to say to this guy, I'd never online dated before, just looked at profiles.

So I sent a polite message and we started chatting. I explained that I was leaving for Australia the next evening and we just kept chatting. He seemed to believe in all the same things I do, monogamy, honesty, true Love, the whole shebang. He was cute and would often misspell words or make grammatical errors, which was endearing as English isn't his first language. 

After two hours of constant talking I threw caution to the wind and asked if he wanted to meet up. He did and we had a great evening together watching the light show at Marina Bay followed by dinner and a cab to our respective homes, which ended in a rather awkward handshake. After that I thought I had had a better time than Dave and decided to text him to get the inevitable rejection over and done with.

To my surprise Dave said he had a great time and after a bit more chatting we agreed to meet up in the morning. This was crazy, by now I knew I was falling for him and that I was also leaving the country the very next day. I told myself that although it was crazy, it was a shot at something great and that when you get a shot at something like that, you take it, you take it without reservation, because you get so few chances in life when it comes to romance. 

The next day we met up and took in the botanical gardens, they were beautiful and the chemistry between us kept growing. It was thrilling, but looking back I realise that it was also blinding. Dave told me that he spent most of his time indoors and didn't like to go out and do things much, in fact he rarely went out in the daytime. Now this is not a lifestyle I can embrace, I need to be doing things, to be out enjoying the world, heck I'm in the middle of traveling around it! He also found a cactus that resembled the male member hysterical, which should have been a turn off as I like my comedy a little less crass (OK it's not totally unfunny, but it's really not that funny either). However I was blinded to all of this, willingly letting myself be carried by the euphoria of new love (no capital L). 

As we walked the gardens Dave was polite, cute and funny, he insisted on taking photos of me as I was the tourist and needed a lot of photos. He took care in the photos considering lighting, background, etc, it was nice to see how conscientious he was and it showed he cared about what he was doing, which is attractive to me. He was enthusiastic about the flowers and had opinions rather than just saying something bland like "they're alright I guess". I enjoy it when someone has an opinion on little things, even if it's just which flower or sculpture you likeina garden. It was nice to just talk about what we thought of small things, that he had opinions. 

It was about half way round the gardens that I realised that I had to kiss this boy, or I would regret it. After a couple of freak outs I grabbed him in a tunnel where we were not overlooked and we kissed and it was good, which was a relief. That wasn't the last kiss and we did so pretty much whenever we weren't overlooked.

I realise this post has gone on for a bit so I'm going to cut to the chase, more romantic (platonic) stuff went down and he saw me to the airport. I was devastated, by this point. I was head over heels and considering staying in Singapore, not that I could afford it. 

When I finally went to the departures lounge I could have been sick and cried all at once. All that was going through my mind was that leaving was a huge mistake and that I had to see where this could go. I messaged him and we decided to do this crazy, stupid thing. We decided to try long distance. It was such a relief. We'd work it out, it would be fine, the feelings were strong enough... Well that's what I thought.

Having landed in Australia I quickly messaged Dave and we continued talking at a rate... It was all going well and we talked about everything, I encouraged him to be himself and to be open, but it turned sour very quickly. They say that the brightest flames burn shortest, what they don't tell you is that they also try to burn all your metaphorical sh*t because they're f*cking crazy! (Sorry for the language)

All of a sudden Dave became this controlling, insecure person who would need my attention 24/7. I felt as though I couldn't do anything else. I didn't have data on my plan so I would get respites when I was out of the flat I was staying in, but I would dread coming back to wifi to see tons of messages that needed my I attention. One morning I woke up to twenty three messages. Twenty three gorram messages after having spoken for two to three hours the night before. He even pulled out "I Love you" within a week of meeting him and was pushing me to say it back. 

I started to distance myself and within a day or two came the anticipated question "tell me honestly, is something wrong?" Well of course I said yes. I'd had a relationship like this in the past and it had affected me deeply in a very negative way. I knew this was my out and having learned from my past, I took my exit. 

I deflected the obvious entreaties I'd heard all those years ago when I ended my first relationship and was surprised when Dave said that his insecurity was all a game that he played with guys because otherwise they were intimidated my his hotness and how cool he was. He actually said that it was stupid of me to think he was insecure because "I'm hot and not even fat" and that he hadn't really liked me that much and I was silly to think he would have, because I was so much older than him - he's 27 and I'm 31. 

Now, I don't take being called old as an insult, in fact it's quite the compliment, with age comes experience, wisdom, compassion and much more and I look up to older friends and family. However it was clear that this was meant as an insult. That was my queue to leave, so I told him I was going and blocked him across the internet. I could have stayed and argued it out, heard more supposed insults, but why? If what he was saying was true then I never really knew him and if it was lie I had no reason to respect him and ergo no reason to listen.

So... That was one week of my life, well eight days. From falling, to relationship stress, to breakup and crazy ex routine. 

Would I do it all again? Absolutely! I still believe in the same things I've always believed in. The importance of Love (capital L), fidelity, trust, hard work and wanting more for someone else than you do for yourself. I still want to find that big all time Love and am still looking for it and it alone. If I get another shot at Love, I'll take it. It's foolish I suppose, but then they do say that only fools fall in Love.