爱思英语编者按：朋友在美留学，对青年人间流行的约会文化Hookups颇感不适。在中国，很多人将认真地谈一场恋爱视作青春必修的学分。而在美国，一些事业心强女性却不再愿被恋爱所累。在Hookups中，她们既能从偶尔的约会中享受性爱，也能将更多精力用于学业和事业。

Hookups do not satisfy

Everyone is dating, but no one is in a relationship. My friend Celine summed up her recent cross-cultural dating experiences in the US in one sentence.

Years of dating experience in China couldn't prepare Celine for what she would encounter on college campuses: the hookup culture.

The "hookup culture," as Urban Dictionary puts it, began in early 1990s and replaces traditional dating with casual sex.

"It is like we are having a non-date, a non-relationship, and then a non-breakup," Celine said.

In China, being in a relationship in college is like taking a four credit course in the eyes of many Chinese students, who believe having a serious relationship is necessary lest you waste your youth.

But for some of the frisky among US college campuses, it's all about the academics, according to an article in The New York Times, which gathered women's thoughts on hooking up. In her findings, the author referenced Hanna Rosin's book The End of Men, which says "hooking up is a functional strategy for today's hard-charging and ambitious young women, allowing them to have enjoyable sex lives while focusing most of their energy on academic and professional goals."

Still, some well-educated and open-minded women like Celine are having difficulty dating causally without getting attached. Celine said she repeatedly made the mistake of thinking if she slept with someone, then it meant they were in a relationship. She recently had a fight with her "boyfriend" who did not want to go steady with her.

"He told me he had no feelings for me," Celine said. "I was like, 'How can you have my body, but have no feelings for me?"

There was another guy Celine went out with on a few "dates." One time, after having an intimate moment, she made tea to help him relax. But the guy was in such a hurry to leave that he did not want it.

"I was really angry that he didn't even wait for me to finish my tea," she said, adding she never saw him again.

After rounds of "non-breakups," Celine has learned the hard way she is not going to hook a real boyfriend through hooking up. "Date the Chinese way," she said. "That is the only way that leads you to marriage."

This article was published on the Global Times Metropolitan section Two Cents page, a space for reader submissions, including opinion, humor and satire. The ideas expressed are those of the author alone, and do not represent the position of the Global Times.