Bye Bye Barbara

Former-Girlfriend/Olympic Volunteer: Barbara
So there are a few thing I haven't really talked about on my blog

1. I have begun to take bubble baths on a regular basis while listening to jazz music.
2. I am deathly afraid of my physical therapist, and she seems to love to terrorize me and look forward to making my life almost as miserable as hers. On Wednesday, she said that I have the leg strength of a ten year-old boy. Seriously, if being a half-cripple isn't bad enough I have to deal with this death troll on a weekly basis who hasn't brushed her teeth in a decade.
   
3. And that I have had a 23 year-old Chinese girlfriend named Barbara since the end of the Olympics, and we have a baby together(NOTE: Barbara understands the American sense of sarcasm, so a penguin that I won for her while playing a carnival game has been our pseudo-child. His name is "Jing-Jing" and he loves to eat).

I have not had the greatest week: They have that MTV Show "Best Week Ever", well I would like to rename it "A Tribute to Kicking Matthew Atkinson in the Nuts: Worst Week Ever"....

Eight days ago I had my backpack stolen. That was not so much fun as my entire picture gallery from Hong Kong, Guanghzhou, and Shanghai was on it; although, there are not many pictures from Guangzhou as I would not risk my precious camera in a city full of hoodlums and worse. Another miserable aspect of the life of Matt Atkinson in these days of non-grace has been the horrible fact that since I missed a full week of school for my trip to the above-mentioned cities, I got behind on EVERYTHING. I have written four group/individual papers in 8 days about the ever non-interesting subjects of: Starting an Internet Cafe Business in China, strategy for the international expansion plan of Huawei, M&A of Chinese firms in the developed world, and currency hedging systems. So I have spent more time in my room than a bear in hibernation, and I look like one of those lab rats who can't open his eyes since he has never seen the light. There have literally been two days where I did not leave my apartment! So you could say things were not going well...

I thought that I had finally been given enough smacks in the face for any man to handle, but fate had one last kick in the balls for the grieving author. This morning I was given the finishing blow that I think was meant to make me run for the first flight out of town. It was like when you play the video game "Mortal Kombat" and you have already beat your opponent to a pulp as he aimlessly stumbles to the ground, but before he can crash face first on the ground you can push some secret combination of buttons to do a "finishing move" that adds insult to injury. I remember one of the characters ("Raiden") could rip out his opponent's heart and hoist it in the air to show that he is a real alpha-male, well that's about the equivalent of my miserable morning on this sad and sedated Sunday....I got dumped by my former Chinese girlfriend this morning..................by text message! I meen talk about kicking a man when he is down, this was really unfair. It would have been bad enough in person, or even over the phone, but when I saw the news on my cell phone I actually laughed... Screw you Paris Hilton for giving girls around the world the savvy to text message breakup news in foreign lands...LOL

But first off... a little background about Barbara because I have never really talked about my former flame. I think my former girlfriend Barbara is one of the most beautiful people in all of Beijing. She has a gorgeous face with really thick lips, and doesn't wear a lot of makeup; she has a body that does not have an ounce of fat on it (unlike my voluptuous figure); and she doesn't act pretentious and dresses in Nike style clothes and smokes the occasional lung dart (cigarette) with me, which is a bad habit and I swear I will be quiting by New Year. Barbara (her Chinese name sounds like Mengjie) is studying English in college which means that we can actually communication (unlike the other 95% of women) in this city.. She was an Olympic volunteer when I got her number, I was pretty hammered on a bus getting back from the Olympic Women's Field Hockey Semifinals: so you know it had to be true love at first site. We went to see Olympic Boxing together, and then had a really romantic date at Hou Hai, and well the rest has been history.

She is a busy lady as she goes to school full-time; works at different jobs; lives with her family and is doing stuff with them constantly; oh and she actually has friends. She also recently got over a long-term relationship, so our little romance was probably doomed from the start. Not to mention the fact that I am a goofy American who is only here on a short-term basis; nevertheless, it has been a blast having a real Chinese girlfriend. Not the kind that just wants an American boyfriend for money or a Visa; or the KTV variety who just wants money and is willing to perform fellatio to get it; or many of the girls out here in the Orient who seem to be fascinated with me because of reasons I really don't understand and I have nothing in common with except for ten fingers and toes. It is actually pretty annoying sometimes walking around here in China, as random Chinese girls who just want something from you come up and harass you. This happens a lot at the really tourist-friendly places like Tianamen Square and I generally wear a low-brim hat and try to act like I just killed a bus filled with nuns so the Chinese women there will leave me alone. I end up treating some of these girls like they are gypsies and give them a stone-cold look which means get out of my way(I am in no way proud of this), because I do not care if I run you over. Anyways, almost all of the girls I have met out here in Beijing are just flawed in too many ways to count, except this crown jewel named Barbara. Many of the other expats out here are hitting up KTVS and dealing with thirsty Chinese women for nothing more than a one-night stand, but I am sad to say I am just too old for this nonsense. Oh, and I can't sing either.

Barbara and I have had some great adventures together: going to theme parks and riding roller-coasters; laughing about how fat our pseudo-child penguin is; having Italian food together and me explaining to her about the fine cuisine of Italy and the Super Mario Brothers; without talking to her and seeing her pretty face in my days after the surgery I don't even know if I would have stayed out here in the Orient. She has constantly kept me on stable ground, even though I don't see her that often because she actually has a life.

But alas, the days of Matt & Barbara have come to a screeching halt. I have given her some serious grief about not hanging out with me as much as I would like, mainly because I don't have anything to do and she actually does so this situation has gotten a little rocky. So, I think Barbara finally had enough of my annoying texts; or maybe she got back together with her former boyfriend; it could have been that after having coffee with me this Thursday and being horrified by my atrocious appearance she realized that mating with me would be the worst idea since "New Kids On the Block" got back together; or possibly she has gotten peer-pressured from her Chinese friends to do away with this American devil...Who knows? I hope that I will see her again, but right now that is only a 50-50 shot. Listed below is the text that I got this morning from Barbara...
"No, I think I don't fit to have a boyfriend now. I am always busy on my study and job."
SENT AT: 1:31 (WOW! I thought it was much earlier.)

Now that I have already gotten dumped I am going to have to come clean about one thing. I could not find Barbara's email address two days ago, and I google searched her name (Mengjie) to try to find it. To my dismay and amazement, I actually got taken to a site that was Mengjie's (Barbara) blog and I could not believe how incredibly attractive that she is. I guess if you are going to date a Chinese girl on a study-abroad mission you might as well pick the best... This blog (that I will probably be blocked from tomorrow) had a photo gallery of my lovely Barbara wearing a bikini for all the world to see. I was not impressed that revealing photos of my lady-tiger are probably being stared at by Chinese metrosexuals as I type this blog. Then I saw a blog post from Barbara (which I will say was from about eight months ago) that scared the living daylights out of me, as her ex-boyfriend was written about as if he was the spawn of Satan. Funny thing is, I was online and Im'd a couple of my friends telling them how sexy my Chinese girlfriend was at this time...Like this just happened! LOL So I guess I got what I deserved as Miss Barbara gave me the axe today. I can't blame her, I am not the kind of guy that a Chinese family would embrace. I never met them, and it is probably the only reason I am still alive today...

But all in all I'm actually really good. A little sad, but not like super-sad. I played chess with my Australian bro this afternoon and we made a scene talking about all kinds of madness that attracted the attention of everyone in the room. I'm looking forward to my next five weeks in the Orient, and have actually decided to stay longer (new departure date is January 3rd). Back when I got here I just kept thinking about leaving, but now I'm content to live a life China. This is pretty unbelievable since I have been a human pinata for the Chinese to hit with baseball bats over the last few months, but I actually still love it out here. I'm even gonna do some job interviews in the coming weeks to see if I can't get a job living out here in the Orient after I graduate from Pepperdine. How the worm has turned my friends... Let's hope that I have paid my dues and am in store for some good luck, and Barbara if you do read this far (and don't feel like gouging my eyes out), please make sure to take care of our child. I hate to be a dead-beat dad, but it is time for me to go...


bye bye Barbara,

Father of Jing-Jing