By TIANTIAN XIANGSHENG
Education Correspondent
BEIJING (China Daily Show) – An English student has spoken of her regret, after drunkenly sabotaging a burgeoning language partnership with an American filmmaker by sleeping with him.
Xiao Lingling, who likes to be called “Josephine” or “Happy,” placed an advert with an English-language website seeking a native speaker for “language partners, so we can learn each other.”
The ad explained she was “funny, liked family, am easygoing and pretty.”
Within minutes, former Michigan resident Ethan Morgan replied offering assistance. The two met at a downtown coffee shop and quickly hit it off.
“Ethan hadn’t brought any of the study guides we talked about on the email and his Chinese was very poor at the time, but we still managed to learn things from each other,” Xiao recalled. “I taught him to count to five in Chinese, and he showed me how to make the coffee ‘Irish.’”
Unfortunately, Xiao – who also goes by the name of “Sally” or “Dreamcatcher” – felt dizzy soon afterwards and had to be taken home. It was here, she admitted, that the meeting went awry and the pair ended up in bed together.
“I woke up much later, and Ethan had left a very kind note, saying how much he enjoyed our talk, but that he felt uncomfortable continuing our exchange under the circumstances,” said a tearful Xiao.
“I totally ruined our language partners!”
Morgan didn’t respond to emails but China Daily Show managed to catch up with him by replying to another advert he’d recently placed, seeking “a Chinese friend to swap culture, stories and language. Women only.”
Morgan agreed to discuss the aborted relationship after a few drinks.
“I met Jennifer at Starbucks, where she immediately asked me to call her ‘Fluffy.’ We had a couple of drinks, flirted and went back to hers. That was it, really,” shrugged Morgan, a former student who recently began working on an independent documentary project, which is as yet untitled.
Meanwhile, Xiao says she is determined not to let the matter affect her further education.
“I’m putting this mistake behind me,” she said. “I have already met a very nice English man on the subway, called Bernard. He is eager to meet us at a place called the Vic’s Club, next Friday at midnight.”
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