Why I love Chinese girls!

Chinese people really DO mean "definitely" when they say it, but they will "definitely" change their minds. They are "more flexible," she said.

The Chinese host gave a very good answer. The longer I live in China the more I think I am living through an episode of The Goon Show.

At the very least, by pretending to be Neddy I find I can cope better with the fluid approach of Chinese people to anything we see as absolutes, including things like 'truth'.

My gf has found a work-around to the problems that might be caused by committing to future plans. 'No Plan', is her normal response.



   

After reading several of the accounts of people's perceptions of "Chinese Girls," I start to think there really is a problem of our not knowing what they are like NOT in our own presence. For example, if someone remarks that Chinese "girls" would consistently sleep with him on the 2nd date, this isn't really an observation about Chinese "girls" in general (assuming it's true). The field needs to be narrowed to "Chinese women who were receptive to dating Western men," and perhaps even, "Chinese women who were receptive to dating Western men, and who had gone to a bar to meet them" or "who met them online." There could be many more narrowing qualifications to the point where a general conclusion that "Chinese girls sleep with men on the 2nd date" (not that anyone explicitly declared that) would be completely misleading. Expats don't date Chinese women who won't date Expats.

Another reading of the same scenario could be that young Chinese women who are looking for a Western husband and assume that dating is a definite prelude to marriage and NOT casual, will engage in sex more readily than their Western counterparts. Then, shortly thereafter, when they realize their folly, move on. Recently a Chinese woman who'd been dating a Western man for months asked me, "in the West does dating mean you are going to get married?" She thought it did.

All this makes me more aware of how my own perceptions of Chinese women, and all Chinese people are narrowed by the myopia of my own perceptions as filtered through the interference of my own presence (much as the presence of an experimenter can effect the outcome of an experiment in subatomic physics, or any sociological or psychological test).

After reading several of the accounts of people's perceptions of "Chinese Girls," I start to think there really is a problem of our not knowing what they are like NOT in our own presence.

That is the reason that I said that I would like to hear from a Chinese girl who has not had too much outside influence. I am beginning to think that we may not get an answer.

Although I find Chinese girls almost universally adorable , it's hard for me to lump 700 million of them into any other category than lovely.

I've met some who are fickle and others who are very resistant to any change of mind (even when the situation changes).  Despite the strong cultural predisposition to get married ASAP, I've met plenty who have figured out that it's better to wait for the right guy than to marry the wrong one now - and others who only learned about this the hard way.  I've met some who only love a guy for the size of his very manly . . . wallet, but these have been far far fewer than tales of "all those evil gold diggers" would have otherwise led me to believe.

I think the reasons for this can be boiled down to a few things.  1.  China has so many localized differences that "Chinese Culture" can't be fully defined beyond the local or regional level.  Since I live in a city full of people from all over China, the differences between my section of my little local village (where I know every guy's family name - they all have the same name) and the city center next door are huge.  2.  China is in the midst of a huge societal shift as modernization works its way inland from the coastal provinces at a faster and faster rate.  3.  Western ideas are coming in via the media and internet.  4.  Life here would be boring if all those pretty girls thought and acted exactly the same.  Life here is never boring.

Quote from: Ben-Dan on March 17, 2011, 06:00:27 AM

After reading several of the accounts of people's perceptions of "Chinese Girls," I start to think there really is a problem of our not knowing what they are like NOT in our own presence.

That is the reason that I said that I would like to hear from a Chinese girl who has not had too much outside influence. I am beginning to think that we may not get an answer.

Are there no Chinese women on this forum? I hadn't really thought about it until you pointed it out. In fact, it just occurred to me, I might really not like to know what "Chinese girls" think of expat men. I know in Thailand some Thai women asserted that foreign teachers were "bad," pure and simple.

Quote from: Granny Mae on March 17, 2011, 11:09:09 AM

Quote from: Ben-Dan on March 17, 2011, 06:00:27 AM

After reading several of the accounts of people's perceptions of "Chinese Girls," I start to think there really is a problem of our not knowing what they are like NOT in our own presence.

That is the reason that I said that I would like to hear from a Chinese girl who has not had too much outside influence. I am beginning to think that we may not get an answer.

Are there no Chinese women on this forum? I hadn't really thought about it until you pointed it out. In fact, it just occurred to me, I might really not like to know what "Chinese girls" think of expat men. I know in Thailand some Thai women asserted that foreign teachers were "bad," pure and simple.

We've got a very limited number of Chinese members.  Raoul and Noles would know the stats, but I think most of them are spouses of evil foreigners expats.  That would unfortunately disqualify them from not having had too much outside experience, but I'd still love to hear their viewpoints.

Let's face it.  Not all foreign teachers want to put the local girls on pedestals and admire them.  Quite a few FTs just want to see how quickly they can score with as many as possible.  Just as it's possible to form a bad stereotype of Chinese girls from meeting one or two bad ones (it pains me to admit it, but I do have evidence that there are at least 2 bad Chinese girls amongst the 700 million of them here), there are plenty of opportunities for Chinese (Thai, etc.) girls to form a bad stereotype of foreign teachers from meeting Stil or George bad FTs.

I start to think there really is a problem of our not knowing what they are like NOT in our own presence.

Not sure what that means ... but this link may give some insight ... and the site may provide useful clues:
  http://www.lovelovechina.com/girls/foreign-prince-on-white-horse/

I loved the line in the comments on that site:

 "I'm not picky, waiting for a guy on a white horse. It can be a white BMW."

Check out this video by a group of unmarried Chinese women:
http://offbeatchina.com/leftover-women-in-china-speak-their-heart-out-no-house-no-car-no-bride

Key lines from their song:

骂我拜金我也不受伤
Call me a money worshipper, I don’t care

男人总得有个男人的模样
A man should be what a man is meant to be

没车没房 你别想找新娘
No car, no house, no bride

你没有车 你没有房

If you have no car, nor a house

别想把美女泡上床

Don’t expect to hook up with any hotties:

I don't really want to go the looks category in this video but honestly only about 2 girls in this group wouldn't give me a fright if I bumped into them on a dark night.
Most look like absolute darkness would be the best lighting to accent their features.



我也有车 我也有房

I also have a car, I also have a house

还有人民币在银行

As well as RMB in the bank

Then why do you want mine?

I don't really want to go the looks category in this video but honestly only about 2 girls in this group wouldn't give me a fright if I bumped into them on a dark night.
Most look like absolute darkness would be the best lighting to accent their features.

Sometimes ugliness of the soul can end up written on the face.


Somehow, I've managed to avoid that type almost completely.  The girls I spend time with are wonderful in heart and soul - and it shows on their faces.

Sometimes ugliness of the soul can end up written on the face.

Nice one!    One reason why, as I mature grow older and wiser visibly decay, I look at the eyes first.

A friend of mine summed it up a long time ago, from his perspective: "Here at least they TRY." Try what? Try to be pretty, sexy, feminine. I haven't been back to the West in so long I don't even know what Lao Wai Nu Ren look like anymore, hardly, unless I see them on TV or on holiday so am not startled by how slim the Chinese girls are in comparison. Reports from back in the West are a bid dire however, and I think I could easily be dwarfed and only be eligible to respective "featherweight" bouts.

So, yeah, the "girls" here are more feminine in appearance and behavior, and buy into the whole idea of it, try to be cutesy forever and like that. I can see why that would appeal to lots of guys. The tide of feminism and gender politics hasn't hit the short here yet, not really, and it's a bit like traveling back in time. This is probably good for the guys ('cause all the cards are stacked in their favor), but not the ladies, who have to try so hard to be sexy and it seems like even compete with hookers for their man's attention.

I'm just guessing it's that more than the purely biological stuff (except in Escaped Lunatic's case, in which he's absolutely smitten with everything about Chinese ladies, even the one's that win power lifting competitions in the Olympics or sport mustaches). That also connects with the stuff guys say about the attitudes of Western women.

My take on this, one one level, is that people can be attracted to whomever they want, and there's nothing wrong with liking a feminine "girl", but us guys might keep in mind that the reason the "girls" are so feminine has a lot to do with a patriarchal society in full swing and women occupying a subordinate, often subservient, and otherwise compromised position.

I have a different theory.  The Party thrust women into the workforce way back in the Fifties.  Take the engineering fields: while China doesn't have a 50-50 gender balance, the proportion of women dwarfs that of Canada. 

So I argue that China largely sidestepped the acrimony of reform and backlash that characterized the struggle for women's rights in the West.  I won't go so far as to say women have an equal shot at advancement, or that Chinese bosses don't play grabass with their female subordinates, just that women's access to jobs doesn't seem to be an issue.

Given this, perhaps Chinese women feel no need to "masculinize" their appearance and demeanour at work.

Of course, given that I'm a middle-aged male foreigner, I could well be wrong. 

I won't go so far as to say women have an equal shot at advancement, or that Chinese bosses don't play grabass with their female subordinates, just that women's access to jobs doesn't seem to be an issue.

Given this, perhaps Chinese women feel no need to "masculinize" their appearance and demeanour at work.

Interesting theory. There might be truth in it in some situations. I always like getting a lady taxi driver, and was surprised to see them here. There are lots of lady traffic cops as well. So, I think you're at least partially right about job access (I can't grant more than partially right to anything I haven't researched the living crap out of).

So, you say, a woman doesn't need to be manly to get the job, so she can be cutesy/sexy. Now I'm starting to shake my head. I just remembered an article on ChinaSMACK about a talent/beauty contest held for prospective female employees at big companies in China. Let me look it up. Somebody probably posted it in Raoul's, at least that's why I think I saw it in the first place, so you may remember it as well.

Ah, here it is:

In Chengdu, beautiful girls walk the catwalk to apply for jobs, while CEOs sit in the audience to evaluate them


On the evening of November 27th, within a hotel in Chengdu, 40 young beauties walked the catwalk/runway. They are not models nor are they contestants in a beauty pageant, but rather they are here to apply for jobs. Those recruiting them are 80 company CEOs beneath the stage in the audience. Was this recruiting or for finding marriage partners? This incited a lot of questions and suspicions from city residents.

link: http://www.chinasmack.com/2010/pictures/40-young-pretty-girls-walk-runway-seeking-jobs-from-80-recruiting-ceos.html

So, yeah, maybe while the women can get the job, it looks like sometimes they need to look pretty (and quite possibly are intended to put out). Actually, the more I think about it, even in the West there's no pressure for women to look masculine in the workplace to get a job. Quite the opposite, I think.

I think I'm going to stick with my theory = patriarchal society values women for being submissive, docile, cute, and sexy (I suddenly remembered a male Chinese colleague being surprises at how well I treat the less attractive "girls" in my classes), and they largely go along with it whether they want to or not. Do I need to qualify that I could be wrong, or does my name and avatar cover me for that? [can never get a post off without multiple typos, damnit.]