Date My Mate: Christian dating
done good. Are you single? Love loving
the Lord? Do you have a friend of the
opposite sex who you don’t secretly fancy, but know he/she would be a great catch
for someone else? Then this event is for
you….
I first heard about Date My Mate through my flatmate several months ago. She’d been to the first of this type of event
the evening before and had asked if I’d gone too. I was a little deflated that a Christian
singles event had come and gone without my knowing about it, and so I did the
modern thing and ‘liked’ its Facebook page in order to prevent news of future
events escaping me again. Then, finally,
several weeks ago the next Date My Mate schedule was set… I grabbed myself a mate, waited out the lead
up and last Thursday off I went.
I was more excited about the event during the days leading up to it
than on the actual day. I woke up last
Thursday with a sense of, well, dread, to be honest. Conversing in the kitchen that morning with
my flatmate who was also going, my fears were further compounded when she
reported in more details the unravelling’s of the previous event. It was
packed – you couldn’t move and so it was not conducive to meeting anyone. It was a meat market. The guys didn’t want to be there; they simply
came as a favour to their female counter-parts.
Hmpf, this was exactly what I didn’t want to hear. A number of years ago I tried my luck at
Christian speed dating. And then some
months later I tried it again. The first time was ok, although the one guy I
thought might be alright I side-lined due to another possible romantic interest
at the time (really, why did I go?). The
second time around, I met many of the guys I’d met the first time. On both occasions at least half of the guys
reported that they weren’t really there on their own accord, but that their
friend had organised the event and begged them to come due to a (severe)
shortage of men. It was a good way to
end a conversation (and ward off any inclination to hold future conversations
in another setting).
In true female form, I put considerable thought into my glad rags. Nice, but not too nice. Feminine, but not too girly-girl. Nothing that is too warm (lots of people
equals lots of heat), but at the same time one doesn’t want to expose too much
skin. I got nowhere very quickly with
this pattern. Scratching my head, I
texted a friend for emergency fashion input and managed to reduce my wardrobe
possibilities to two winning numbers: a black, just-above-the-knee skirt
boasting of a bit of flair (diagonal pocket and a silk triangle feature on the
front), and a simple fitted pink tee.
With my heels on and my hair straightened I was on my way.
After exiting the car with a friend I’d shared a lift with, I silently
gaged my own nervousness. I decided it
wasn’t too bad; I’d managed to cull any excessive anxiety by telling myself
that I was simply here for research purposes. I needed to observe the goings-on so that I
could write about it and keep other Christian populace informed should they
venture this way in future. Though I
knew my expectations were greater than this, it did help me maintain a
reasonable level of calmness.
Nearing closer to the building, the bar could have passed for a hip
Friday night location to any unaware passer’s-by (except, of course, that it
wasn’t Friday). The music was pulsating from
the inside out and preparations for entry (find your mate of the opposite sex)
were being made by many a single-goers on the footpath. I found my mate, then introduced my flatmate
to her male-counterpart for the evening (a necessary wangling to get them entry
– a blind date my mate, as it was). There
was nothing left now but to head into the crowd in doors.
Upon entering the bar, one of the first thoughts I had was: how can I possibly meet a decent portion of
these guys? there are just too many. On the other hand, when was the last time I
could actually say “too many” after referring to guys? Bustling through the crowd we made our way
to the bar ahead. My mate kindly shouted
me a beverage and now with a glass of Pinot Gris in hand, it was time to
circulate.
Therein lay a rather sizable problem in itself though: the room was densely
packed. It felt like being a piece of
lettuce in a club sandwich with an assortment of other garden delights packed
solid and deep on either side (on the topic of sandwiches, as one guy
suggested, a picnic might have been a sound alternative to the arrangement we found ourselves in). It occurred to me at that moment that it
wouldn’t have mattered what I wore, no one could see me from the neck down at
any rate. To find someone (I know,
probably could have gone for a better choice of words), I either had to elbow my
way through the masses or toddle around the perimeter of the room where it was
a little less populated. It turns out there
is only so much saying “excuse me” you can do before you feel like you’ve
become a threat to other people’s comfort, I discovered.
Not to sound further down on the event, I do have to mention one other
hindrance that I could not escape from during the course of the evening: I had to practically yell to be heard. Twenty minutes into my first chat with a guy,
my voice started cutting out mid-sentence. I was then faced with repeating myself if I
wanted to keep the recipient believing I was capable of a half decent
conversation. Small sips of my drink
provided some temporary belief, but two hours later I was quite sure I would
have no vocal ability the following day (which would have made using my voice
to phone in sick to work the next day rather problematic).
In between conversations, I couldn’t help but wonder if I was the only
person moving more than a few feet away in effort to cultivate chats with other
attendees. It’s that whole moment of
thinking am I doing this right? In passing the male friend I had arrived with,
I had to point out to him that he had (at minimum) one big advantage: he was at least a head taller than almost everyone
else present. Not that this is about
physical discovery (although a little eye candy never hurt anyone), but
certainly he had a better idea of where he was going. I, on the other hand, might as well have been
blind folded when moving from one spot to another; it was very much a case of
lucky dip.
One of the best things about this event was that, once you did find
someone new to chat with, there was no stigma attached to starting a conversation
with someone of the opposite sex. In
fact if you couldn’t manage this, you probably wouldn’t have gone there in the
first place. I was expected to be
single, and I was clearly looking given my presence there. And, in real everyday life, it would be nice
if it was always that simple though it seldom is. Even within the four walls of the church,
there is this idea that if you are female and you go out with coffee someone,
it is because you want to marry them (personally, if I was going to propose to
a man, it wouldn’t be over coffee in some bustling café). The fact that Christians struggle to do
dating well - or even to do dating at all - was a topic I discussed with a
couple of the guys I met. There was
unanimous agreement that things needed to improve in this area within church
circles.
By the time I left at around 11pm, I’d met probably close to ten
guys. The thing that I liked most about
the evening was that my fear of there being no men left was dramatically
downsized. Also, there really are some
good men out there. One guy I spoke
with was also a blogger; he blogs on the subject of cricket and apparently has
quite a following. Naturally, I had to
tell him about my own blog site, and because of the nature of the event
(singleton gathering) I didn’t mind sharing that it was mainly written with
single Christian women in mind. He knew
where I was coming from.
Other memorable points about the evening: I’m pretty sure I got spat on when I was near
the bar at one stage. I don’t know what
else it could have been, it wasn’t a kind of dribble of liquid that might
suggest someone got a bit over-expressive with their hand gestures and slopped
a little beverage my way, rather, it came at the side of my face with such
force I wondered if it had been blown through a straw. Perhaps someone was trying to sabotage my
chances with some guy at the bar; go figure.
Second on the list of memorable points was that I left with my
flatmate’s mate, and by that I mean there are no rules and no offences (of
course, if my flatmate had fancied him, oblivion to the rules may have been a
hindrance in the long run and not a help).
And, in case you are wondering, we did not go for a romantic stroll down
Mission Bay; we kept it classy and nipped into McCafe for a late night hot chocolate
and a good chat to boot.
About the days to follow: I would strongly recommend to anyone who goes
that you contact people fairly soon after the event. I don’t say this because I’ve seen the
opposite done and its turned out badly, I say it because you might as well
utilise some of the momentum straight afterwards. And also because waiting can breed over-analysis,
so why do it? I also suggest that, if
someone asks you and you aren’t really convinced that they could be a match for
you, that you put the effort in and go out with them anyway. I’m personally not a big believer in first
impressions, if I’m to be honest. It can
take me a while to really ‘notice’ a guy; if it’s like this for me, then it
might be like this for others also.
Now, in case you are wondering what came of this for me, well, that
would be a whole other blog :P
This event was held in February 2013. Blog posted several weeks afterwards
