Confessions of a Cat-holic (172)

I swore I didn't say anything when Jason mentioned Eddie that night. Somehow Jason already assumed that the guy I was having in mind was Eddie. To my surprise, Jason then went on and talked non stop for around 15 minutes about what he didn't like about Eddie. Okay, I had a feeling that Eddie was a jerk, if what Jason told me was true. Despite the fact that they were good friends and hall mates for more than 2 years, Jason emphasized to me that Eddie was a guy who was full of himself with the hallucinations that all girls would fall for him without even asking them out. According to Jason, Eddie was arrogant to a point where Eddie would consider himself the hottest guy on earth. I had a feeling that Eddie was a self absorbed douchebag who thought he had the magic power to light up the room wherever he went.

So Eddie was such a despicable person in Jason's eyes. That sort of made me curious to hear what Sharon could say about me behind my back. Maybe I was equally despicable in Jason's eyes too, given that he went out with Sharon. I was pretty sure Jason and Sharon must have shared some sort of same values or belief system to be a college couple. I knew that peer review could be a very efficient and fast way to get to know a person but then usually hearing about a person from his rivals could be somewhat biased.

Ironically, overheard from gossips and chitchats with my friends in New York, I later found out that Jason wanted to set Eddie up with Jessica (Edmond's current wife), while Sharon wanted to set Edmond up with Jessica. Oh my god, Manhattan you were such a messy place. Somehow it worked out though. Eddie didn't go out with Jessica, he went out with me. And through my online marketing platform, Jessica thought that Edmond was a better catch. It was almost like watching William Shakespeare's "As you like it" as a reality show.

Maybe this could be my most heartfelt confession. It was that I thought that I would stay single forever in Hong Kong. I even thought about cloning myself. After all, I intended to major in biology and specifically biomedical engineering. I seriously thought about having test tube babies in a lab because I already gave up my hopes for heterosexual reproduction . The reasons were less obvious. Even though many people thought that I could easily date anyone as I liked given that I had the body of 林志玲 and the face of 李嘉欣, (heartfelt gratitude in such compliments despite also rumors of me having undergone a series of plastic surgeries to look the way I was fantasized), I guessed many people overlooked the competition in the dating scenes of Hong Kong. Mid twenties onwards all the way til my early thirties was the most stressful times of my life. Many people overestimated the abundance of eligible bachelors in Hong Kong and the media encouraged polygamous relationships. There were many girls out there in Hong Kong who could be more aggressive and attractive than me, while the number of guys worthy for marriage was scarce, which placed some of the desirable bachelors such as even the brothel scumbag Edmond onto the cream of the crop or the tip of the social pyramid, with unlimited supply of one-night-stand girls ready to trade sex in the hope of an exchange of stable relationship. What happened to Edmond was history. All I could say was that he made good use of his looks, education, qualifications and profile as a Yale graduate on an island hungry for scholarly bachelors.

Hong Kong was known for producing super models, beauty pageants, international movie actresses, while also widely applauded for making legendary figures like Danny Chan and Leslie Cheung. Hey, these super stars obviously had their share of market audience in Hong Kong. Who was I to say otherwise? I often thought that I deserved no chance to get married in such a competitive city. It was like a lucky draw or lottery. So many people lined up for a change in destiny. And I could not even fight for a decent job opening with my impressive resume and past achievements. Given that so many people liked to steal my stuff, I had a feeling that I could never keep a guy long enough until marriage.