Since we are speaking on the subject of those online dating services, ever notice that there are a growing number of those sites dedicated to the Asian market. Now, I am *not* stupid enough to rip on other sites and reveal their URLs, but let's just say that you can find them easily if you type in "Asian online dating" on any search engine. Starting with the huge boom of ICQ usage several years ago, thousands of Asian people are now online everyday looking for love in all the wrong places. My question is, does this really work? Are there any successful matches that were made on any of these so-called "dating" sites? Being the intrepid reporter that I am, I signed myself on to one of the more popular Asian dating sites to see if *I* can get some online lovin' from my fine Asian sisters.

Please take note that *this* (fingers proudly pointing to chest) Asian stud doesn't need to go online to find a girl. ('Cause I'd rather go to one of those massage parlors)

After establishing my "online profile", which consisted of some pictures, screen name, and this silly "personality test" that displays your likes and dislikes in some type of graph. As I browsed thorough the many listings in the category for "18-25 year old Women seeking for Men," one question continued to go through my mind. It's true that many of these ladies seeking other men are indeed fairly attractive. I saw a couple of girls that really could pass for models- unless they were uploading other people's pictures. I got to ask these ladies-"Why are you online?" Trust me, some of these ladies looked so good Bill Clinton would probably offer them a paid internship.

I had a hoot reading through all these ladies' profiles-they were all claiming such ideal values such as "the man doesn't have to be good looking, but a kind heart...blah blah blah." Needless to say, I decided to put their "values" to the test. I entered the chat room with my screen name, A….nah, I am not going to tell you. (BTW, it is not AJA) I entered the "looking for romance" chat group and cordially introduced myself to my cyber buddies. Pretty soon, I was engaged in light conversation with a couple of Chinese ladies from San Jose, California. When they asked to see my picture, I quickly searched around the site and found the most unattractive guy pic and uploaded it to them. I had a great laugh as those two girls logged off the chat room faster than you can say "bingo". Looks don't matter hmm?

My good buddy Will, who works at a mall I won't name (cough...Stonestown) has a perfect example of why you don't always trust the pictures you see on these sites. Mind you, I am not blaming these sites at all for any false pictures posted, I am merely trying to caution you on the dangers of trusting your own eyes. Will had liked this one girl he's been chatting with online for a couple of weeks now. He even showed me the picture she sent him over the Internet. Right away, I thought something was up, because the picture was of her sort of far away from the camera, with her face turned sideways, so that we only saw her profile. It was kind of dark too, so we couldn't make out much details of her anyway. Nevertheless, Will was in *love* so he was adamant about meeting with her, despite my concerns. On that fateful day, Will got all dressed up in his best K-Mart clothing, and waited at his home; they decided to meet at his place. When she finally arrived, Will opened the door with lots of anticipation. What he got in return was an "interesting" (his words) experience.

In his words, this girl was "not what he expected" and certainly not representative of the picture she sent him. Being the nice guy, he took down the block for some ice cream; it was here that the straw broke the camel's back. As she wolfed down her triple deck ice cream cone, (in less than six bites) some ice cream dripped down her fingers. Now, Will didn't know whether she was trying to be sexy, or if she was still hungry, but she proceeded to lick all the dripping ice cream from her fingers. Upon seeing this perceived act of seduction, Will quickly got up and ran out the door of the ice cream parlor. As he ran off, the woman shouted, "where are you going?" Reaching the door, my friend turned around and quickly said, "I forgot to feed my cat" and ran off. True story, folks.

Some of you may hate me by now, but I still encourage everyone to send in his or her own online dating horror stories to me at aja@asianmall.com. Reminder: if you are going to bash people, don't forget to use aliases and personal information. Now, don't think that I write about this topic without any bad experiences myself. This past month, I wanted to further investigate the trials and tribulations of finding dates online, so I actually agreed to a date with this one girl who was emailing and chatting with me on one of those aforementioned sites. When this girl sent me her picture, it was obviously fixed on Photoshop or something. Upon seeing this, I already knew something was up, but was curious to really prove myself right. So when I met her, she wasn't what she described herself as on her profile. The funny thing was that wasn't what disturbed me about my encounter with her; during the whole time, this girl was unabashedly flirtatious, taking every opportunity to do stuff to me. Although I didn't make a dramatic exit like my friend, I did tell her that I only wanted to be friends.

The moral of the day, boys and girls, is that if you are going to go to those online dating sites, please just be truthful in your descriptions of yourselves. There is no need to put up a front because we will all find out your real nature someday. Just be honest with your profile and meet real people who are interested in the real you. That's it, game's over and I am out of here. I will be back with another AJA Column later, so in the meantime, you can email me with anything, and if I like it, I will put your message online and make you famous!

Bye!

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