I started dating a veterinary surgeon. Mr. Lion was his nickname in the personal site that I met him, and he friggin’ was in charge of the veterinary hospital at the zoo. Also, remember that I am a pet addict and I have had a encounters with animals. Yet, I was not prepared for this. I wouldn’t want to call it an ordeal—just an unfortunate mixture of circumstances that made me feel icky.
So, I meet this guy at a personals site. His profile reads interesting and we exchange messages. Soon we exchange numbers and he calls me this Friday noon. The first thing that I hear after a “Hello” from his end is a “meow!” Now, I am not really “turned on” by animals per se. But in this case, my curiosity was aroused.
It turned out that he had two apartments and seven cats in total, with two in his study/work apartment. He sounded really nice on the phone and we decided on meeting up on Sunday evening. I wanted the date to extend to dinner but he had to keep his usual Sunday dinner commitment with his family.
On Sunday, we meet up at the railway station close to his apartment—on a platform, and not outside the station. Weird. The first thing that he explains to me is that he’s in an unfortunate situation where one of his “bois” might also arrive later to join us that evening. He explained to me carefully that it’s not going to be a ménage et trois. Creepy.
It was drizzling that evening. We walk on this dirt path parallel to the railway station, through a market, and finally take a minimum fare ride on a rick to his apartment building. It was an old building that seemed destined to undergo renovation into a high-rise or something. We walk up the staircase and reach his door.
The moment we walked in the door, this amazing veterinary hospital-esque stench pierces my nostrils. I saw one his two cats that was meowing. The room was ill lit to start with and to distract myself, I went after the cats. The walls were lined with bookshelves with all kinds of books. I find the two cats up on the couch behind the partition wall that separated the big room into two.
I hear him closing the curtains, thus filtering out the bare amount of light in the room. I could barely make out the cat feed which was lying in a bowl on the floor. I could see a bathroom (where the cats go and do their bowel/urinary evacuations) with an incandescent bulb which was streaming some light to the room.
Then the turns on this crazy blue 0-watt bulb. He invites me to sit on another couch on the other side of the partition. He pours two glasses of wine and we finally start a conversation. The cats join us in a bit—one chooses to snuggle up with us and the other curls up on top of the television.
In this under-lit scenario, we can hardly see each other faces. But the cats can do much better. The friendlier cat starts playing with me. He constantly licked, bit, and chewed on my feet, hands, and forearms. Trust me, it was painful at times. He wanted to really make a move on my face, but my hair was too scary for him, I guess.
The conversation was smooth more or less, but weird, primarily because of the atmospheric hindrances from my side. There were a couple of times where there was just the weird silence filled with growls and meows of the cat. After an hour or so of this intense creepiness, we finally stumble upon an interesting “I know your ex lover” situation and bitch about it for a while.
I was more than eager to offer him time to make a move to meet his family when a couple of hours drew to a close. During the entire evening, we barely touched each others hands for a couple of time. On the way out, I was thinking how a date could be disastrous just because of the weirdness associated with the location.
The lesson to be learnt from is this guys: please choose your date and location wisely!
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