Confessions of Valentine's dates gone wrong

We wanted to ‘make love great again’ so we asked our readers for their worst date ever: the most liked entry in our Facebook competition has won two nights at the Radisson in St George’s Bay

Helping you make Valentine's great again!
Helping you make Valentine's great again!

Winner: Karina Makaya

Of all the eye-watering anecdotes of dating carnage, we have a runaway winner: 24-year-old Karina Makaya’s bowl of bad karma earned over twice as many votes as the nearest competitor.

“I met this guy online and decided to meet him after writing for a few days. He was a really nice guy, though he liked to brag about his business a bit. I decided to prank his ego a bit and propose a drinking challenge since it’s something he would automatically assume to be better at... I’m very intolerant to alcohol, therefore, I had to come up with something which would make my drinks slip aside. I decided to take a huge wide bag and put a deep bowl inside. Since the bar is very poorly lit, he wouldn’t see the drinks going a bit away from my mouth.

Karina Makaya
Karina Makaya

"We came to the bar, started drinking and I, in my clumsiness, poured the tequila onto myself instead of into the bag on my lap! The guy jumped to help, took the bag from my knees, put it on a chair next to me and continued to wipe my blouse. With my secret second drinking mouth being away, I had to continue drinking to keep up the appearances. After that, I just remember telling him how I liked swinging as a girl after which I fell asleep! In the middle of the bar! The guy stayed with me until the bar closed, then the staff woke me up. At least he didn’t find the secret bowl and at least I didn’t throw up.”

So congratulations Karina, you win 2 nights at the Radisson! Additionally, because you’re not a politician, you can go crazy with the minibar! 

You will, however, have to make your own swinging arrangements.

Our favourite entries

From hidden second mouths to melancholy manchildren to surprise moonblood, your toe-curling stories of first dates gone wrong have caused no end of amusement in the MaltaToday newsroom. Here are the top entries:

Starting from the bottom, it was an undeservedly poor showing for frustrated carnivore Andrew Milner’s rib-tickling tale of tuxedos, incontinence and heartbreak:

“...The night of the ball comes along, I’m there in a tuxedo, bow tie and shiny shoes surrounded by my friends as we awaited her arrival. Then she got there, beautiful as I had imagined in a wonderful ball gown and great smile. Through the starters we laughed and joked, flirted a lot, and started to have quite a good amount of chemistry until the mains arrived...And there it was. A vegan dish. My friends had set me, a man whose meals normally require the slaughter of at least 2 different animals, with a girl who won’t even eat a cheese sandwich because it came from an animal. She was effectively going to sit next to me and eat the food that my food would eat. It was heartbreaking...I have a hard time hiding my displeasure at certain things, and didn’t actually say another word to her the entire night other than at the end of the meal when I said ‘Have a good night’ and went off to associate myself with normal folk instead. To top it off the meat I had eaten was not cooked properly and I ended up...slightly soiling myself...which meant that a vegan had won that night too.”

Jordana Mckenzie’s date definitely deserves to have his man card revoked. 

“Guy was over hour late! All he talked about was his ex, his brat children, living with his mother and her ironing his underpants, how much debt he was in...THEN....he conveniently couldn’t find his wallet at bill time! I was ready to pay half but ended up footing the bill.”

Duplicitious Andre Sciberras “sent roses to 2 different persons not knowing that the day after they were going to tell each other about it. (Didn’t know they were close friends!)” That must have been fun trying to explain. Remember: Facebook is your friend, Andre.

Heidi A Holt’s menstrual mayhem brought a tear to our eyes. 

“Worst ever has to be blind date. Me in a pair of skin tight white jeans. Unfortunately my monthly came a week earlier than normal.
Don’t know how long I had a blood red patch across my bum before an old woman let me know. Spent the rest of the date in the ladies toilets trying to wash the jeans in a tiny hand sink and a hand dryer to dry them. Never heard from the lad ever again for some strange reason."

Chin up Heidi, it could have been worse – he, err, could have been a vampire?

Tonio Magro’s (Age: 20) date-us interruptus was mercifully short:

“Went for my date near her house, picked her up. She had influenza and she sneezed. I offered her tissues and I told her I had a packet in the dashboard drawer. When she opened it, she saw some photos of my ex, and from the look on her face I realised I’m finished before I begun... I totally forgot about them, as I wanted to throw them away the day before. She told me to stop at a bus stop and my date was bye bye ... 15 minutes MAX.”

Most dramatic crash and burn” would be Dona Caruana’s entry. 

“After 2 years with a guy we went out for Valentines. We ate Chinese and had a bottle of wine. Half way through dinner he was telling me something about his childhood. He had a big depression and was on pills. I quickly realised that he switched off and became depressing. Changed the subject quickly. He took me home and on the way he stopped the car and just left. I was left in the middle of Kappara at 1 in the morning. short dress high heels. took off shoes and started running home...I saw him coming back and he made me give the silver earrings he just gave me. I thought I was in a film.”

Despite the Valentine’s day disaster, we hope you gave the guy a chance. 2 years is a long time to hide depression and childhood trauma from a romantic partner!

Thank you all for your submissions and interactions and please stay tuned for more news and competitions on our Facebook page!