Hey guys,
I moved to China 11 months ago. Before I came, I only knew super basic things about Chinese like how to pronounce pinyin, a few simple characters, and a few useful phrases. Now I'm certainly not fluent, but I can have simple conversations with strangers introducing myself, asking basic personal questions, ask for directions, order food, buy train/plane tickets, etc. I am basically illiterate and can only recognize about 20% of the characters for words I know. I study twice a week with a tutor.
I met a girl on a Chinese dating app. She speaks 0 English despite having studied for years when she was in high school. We're both 27. She kinda pretended to when we were chatting by text, but she was just using a translation app. When we met in person for the first time, I figured I'd just be as sexually and romantically aggressive as possible because I didn't think my Chinese was good enough to really date somebody who doesn't speak any English. I figured I'd try to "get away with" as much as possible and just try to push the limits. Unexpectedly, she reciprocated and seems to really like me. We made out after about 3 hours into the first date. All of our conversations are in caveman Chinese.
She's super cute, 160cm, c cups, tiny tiny waist, dark skin, pretty, never wears makeup, educated but between jobs (used to do marketing research).
I'm really conflicted. I knew from the moment I moved here that I'd never go back to the US and would be likely to stay in China forever, so no conflicts there. But I've also only been really studying the language for less than a year. We really can't communicate beyond a really shallow level. The physical/sexual chemistry is very much there and I'm really attracted to her and vice versa. I really wanted to pursue my PhD in HK or SG next year, but I feel like if I get with this girl, I'll have to take time off first to go study Chinese full time for 12-18 months to really be fluent. I currently work full time teaching math and economics.
My mom and dad met in Colombia when my mom was around my age now and her Spanish wasn't fluent yet and he spoke 0 English, but their marriage dissolved after 9 years so it's hardly a relationship worthy of emulating.
What do you guys think? Can this work? Or am i just doing mental gymnastics convincing myself it can work because of shallow and superficial reasons? Does anyone have any first or second hand experience with this kind of situation? Thanks!