There is a reason it took Carey Bradshaw and co. six seasons to settle down and find a man in New York City because, according to one of The Weekly’s single contributors – who will remain anonymous (and perhaps perpetually unattached) – here are some reasons why…
Interestingly for a city made of concrete there are millions of New Yorkers who are experts in playing the field. When I first moved Manhattan in 2015 it was hard not to be influenced by the millions of hours of television and movies that would lend itself to delude me into thinking that despite the chaos (and deranged sex perverts that slipped through the grips of SVU‘s Olivia and Elliot) I would find my own Mr Big waiting for me in the Big Apple.
Well, I wish someone would have told me the following…
Everybody will say they are somebody (else)
I was once regaled with the story of one friend who met Ed Sheeran at a night club. There in the loud music and flickering lights the pair danced and drank and in the morning she was greeted with a, ‘G’mornin’ sweetness’ in thick southern drawl. A far cry from the singer’s creamy British brogue, no?
In the clear light of day he was certainly not Ed, just a red head. He was in fact Tom, a writer at a well-known sports magazine. And despite being an all around nice, there was one obvious exception – he was a big bloody fibber!
Men ask you out in the day time (when they are not even drunk!)
Let’s be real – if you are an Australian woman this is scenario is likely to SHOCK you.
From the local RSL to Ravesis the Australian dating scene has somehow conditioned the women folk of our nation to think that it is only acceptable to be approached well after 10pm, and only by a gussied up bloke that has summoned enough liquid courage to wander over and mutter, “How’s it goin’” – *hiccup – “shhhhhhweetheart?” Oh…That’s how you met your current boyfriend, isn’t it?
Well imagine a world where men flirt with you in the light of day! Like, in supermarkets… around the organic pears at wholefoods…Not.Even.Drunk! Preposterous, right?
Well, be prepared ladies – these New York fellas are full of confidence and will ask you out anywhere, anytime.
Everyone is on Tinder and they are not ashamed…
While the above suggests it’s not hard to get a date nobody has time to waste so they are upping their odds on Tinder, Happen, Raya, or whatever hot new app helps you hook up.
Using Tinder in NYC is not like using it in Oz where our relativity small population might awkwardly suggest you swipe right on your cousin. No, ’cause in a city of 19.7 million – not even including New Jersey – you need to be resourceful in separating the dates from the duds.
Hipster or hobo?
Remember that [homeless millennial who survived the streets of NYC by way of one night stands]( http://www.people.com/article/homeless-man-survives-women-apartments |target=”_blank”)? Y’know the guy who proudly declared he’d rather sleep around and spend his swindled money on drugs than get a job? Well, he’s not the only one.
New York rent is pricey and while you shouldn’t be a social snob asking what people do for work you should perhaps err on the side of caution if potential dates are uber cagey when talk turns to what they do to make a crust.
For clarification, there is nothing wrong with having a relationship with a vagrant – because especially in America, it’s easy to become homeless – but there are some particularly unsavoury types who trawl through the dating scene just avoid paying NYC’s exxy rent and nobody wants to be fooled by a freeloader.
But beware of another type of trickery; Hollywood movie star or homeless? Case in point: here is Keanu Reeves practicing tai chi next to a parking lot – who would have guessed?
All you uni-grads, prepare to lower your standards
Sometimes women in NYC will be left wondering; where are all the great single men in this city? But the fact of the matter is that while the city is full of millions of bachelors, in Manhattan, there are 38 per cent more young female college grads than males. Quite literally there is a “man deficit”.
According to Fortune and Money writer Jon Birger’s book, Date-onomics: How Dating Became a Lopsided Numbers Game, there simply aren’t enough college-educated men to go around.
In the US for every four college-educated Gen Y women there are three college-educated men so the result is what Birger calls a “musical chairs” of the heart; as the men pair off with partners, unpartnered straight women are left with fewer and fewer options — and millions of them are eventually left with no options at all.
Birger says New York’s imbalance is also exacerbated by its large population of gay males – some 9 to 12 per cent of men in Manhattan are gay, according to Gary Gates, a demographics expert at UCLA’s Williams Institute.
What to do then? Birger suggests goes so far as to suggest that if you are a young woman and looking for love, move west.
“As you go from the East coast to the West Coast, the ratios among college grads get a little better,” Birger told Vice in 2015.
But there are plenty of blue collar workers who would make excellent life mates so perhaps you need to be less snobby.
Blue collar workers are great, take Noah for example; he built this house.
After how many dates is it reasonable to suggest sex in NYC?
According to an extensive singles survey compiled by TimeOut unsurprisingly, women in New York prefer to wait longer before giving it up – or so they say.
On average the fem folk claim that 4.6 dates is the right amount of time to wait before getting it on, whereas the fellas think 2.6 dates is their lucky number.
The global average falls in between the two, at 3.5.
It’s not you, it’s New York
For a city that never sleeps there sure is a lot of sleeping around. You could be seeing someone for two years, three times a week to do drinks, dinner and laundry but remember this – you might not be in a relationship.
You only need to ask that woman crying on the park bench (*note: in NYC there is always a woman crying on a park bench) for anecdotal evidence of how she was just dumped by a guy she thought was about to propose but he didn’t even realise they were dating.
So how can one be expected to settle down when the night life, the busy pace and Tinder constantly suggests that The One, that golden unicorn of love, or Ed Sheeran, is just around the corner? Simple answer is most of us won’t. I’m sorry, we can’t – don’t hate us.
A VIDEO you might also like… Beyoncé talks about Blue Ivy
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