Ben Thompson
It always sucks getting ghosted - but imagine getting ghosted when you've flown from Australia to Bali for a date?
That's exactly what happened to Jess Austen, who had been talking to her mystery man for several months online before booking tickets from Sydney to Indonesia to meet him.
You can watch her recount the horrifying tale below:
Advert
However, after travelling for six hours, the 29-year-old was left humiliated after her date didn't show up - leaving her alone in the South Asian country.
Despite her best efforts to get the unnamed man to commit to a day to meet her, Jess was left without a travel companion.
It wasn't until Jess was on the plane home that she bumped into her date-to-be - but she felt too awkward to approach him.
The man eventually explained why he'd fallen off the radar - but his excuse makes him seem even more cowardly.
Jess told news.com.au: "He ignored me, if he saw me – but how could he not? I was standing next to him waiting to get into my row.
"I would have loved to have said something to call him out, but I was a bit embarrassed that I’d gone all that way, been ghosted and now was on the plane alone behind him.
"Feeling insecure, no words were exchanged. He just started straight at the ground and didn’t look around once."
Once she arrived back in Oz, Jess took to TikTok to vent about her experience.
In her video, that has been viewed more than 36,000 times, Jess fumed: "Originally I was going to do a video of like 'Come to Bali with me on our first date'.
"Instead we're going to have a 'What the f**k is wrong with men?' FBI session."
According to news.com.au, Jess said: "I felt stupid when I realised he was never going to meet me.
"I tried not to let it get to me too much and use it as time I needed to recharge, but I was definitely disappointed."
Since the video went viral, Jess was finally able to get an explanation out about why he was a no-show for their tropical date.
She revealed: "He told me that he’d met someone in Lombok and he felt so embarrassed because he’s asked me all the way there so he just disappeared.
"I laid into him about how cowardly that is and that he shouldn’t have invited me if he was going with the intention of meeting whoever and going with the flow.
"There was clearly no importance set on meeting me even though he invited me. It was so cruel."
Jess' experience has resonated with a lot of sympathetic women who took to the comments to share their support.
One wrote: "He was way to up and down from the start I would’ve cut him off straight up."
Another commented: "Red flags from the start girl."