EVER felt like you're the only one with a history of bad dates?

As it turns out, even celebrity babes - former pageant queens to boot - have their share of night outs gone wrong.

Hong Kong TV actresses Kate Tsui and Selena Li, who were in town on Tuesday to promote their new TVB dramas, regaled The New Paper with personal unpleasant dating experiences.

Tsui, 32, recalled a blind date her mum and older sister set up for her earlier this year.

With a sigh, the 2004 Miss Hong Kong pageant winner said: "Both of them are more anxious about my lack of a romantic relationship than I am.

"My mum has so much fun taking care of my sister's two children that somehow, she harbours the hope that I, too, can get hitched quickly and have babies."

Despite being slightly repulsed by the idea of a blind date - "it's so ancient and embarrassing," exclaimed Tsui - she went along with it so as not to let her loved ones' efforts go to waste.

But the date left a bad taste in the eligible bachelorette's mouth.

"We had dinner and that was it. There were no sparks," she said flatly.

Although tight-lipped about the identity of the man ("He's not from showbiz" was all she would say), she revealed that what put her off the most was that he admitted to Googling her beforehand. "For me, that is a major turn-off.

"Hello? Why would you want to Google my name when I'm (going to be ) sitting in front of you? This is a message to all the guys out there who want to date me in the future: Do not Google me. "Anything you're interested to know, just ask me straight."

Tsui also refuted rumours about her on-off romance with fellow TVB actor Ron Ng, calling Ng her "brother".

Ng, 32, is her co-star in cop drama Forensic Heroes III, which premieres on Nov 10 on StarHub Demand TV.

In the show, Tsui plays a senior inspector and Ng, a sergeant.

The crime-solving pair become lovebirds - a scenario which Tsui would have you know did not translate into real life.

"Ron, Raymond (Lam) and I are under the same manager, that's why we're close," she explained. "Every time we meet, it's like a family gathering."

As for Li, 30, she told TNP that it does get "tiring" and "frustrating" having her night outs interrupted.

"There were times when I was out for drinks, and people hanging around - total strangers - started whipping out their mobile phones to take pictures of me.

"Who knows what they'll do with those pictures? They might upload them onto the Internet. Some might even sell them to reporters."

Li, who bagged the Miss Talent and Miss Photogenic titles in the 2003 Miss Hong Kong beauty pageant, was a recent target of Hong Kong's notoriously intrusive paparazzi.

In August, she was photographed clubbing into the wee hours with a man.

In some shots, she had her head on the man's shoulder while in others, he was kissing her forehead. "That guy is my god-brother, but the paparazzi simply assumed and went ahead to write that we were an item," said Li with a grin.

She plays a princess in the historical period drama The Life And Times Of A Sentinel, which is currently showing on StarHub Demand TV.

Was it awkward working on the show with actor Kenneth Ma, whom she was once speculated to be dating? "Not at all," said Li, who also counts TVB artistes Kevin Cheng and Patrick Tang among her previously rumoured hook-ups.

"I remember some time back, when the news about Kevin and I broke, I jokingly texted him, 'Hey, you are my boyfriend now. Haha.'

"I'm not going to change my lifestyle and stop going out just because of the paparazzi."

This article was first published in The New Paper.