Reading two columns of numbers from a text file in python

I have a text file which looks like this (pasting just first few rows):

x   y
4   4
2   5
8   5
8   5
4   5
6   7

I need to read this file and plot a graph of x versus y. This is how my code looks like:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

with open("C:\Vikalp\Learning\Machine Learning\Practice\carstopping.txt") as f:
    next(f)
    data = f.read()

data = data.split('\n')

x = [(row.split('\t')[0]).strip() for row in data]
print(x)

y = [row.split('\t')[1] for row in data]

My print(x) statement is printing lot of ascii stuff:

['\x00', '\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x006\x00', '\x00', '\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x003\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x001\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x003\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x001\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x001\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x006\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x006\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x002\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x002\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x000\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x002\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x006\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x003\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x006\x00', '\x00', '\x003\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x004\x001\x00', '\x00', '\x007\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x006\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x006\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x005\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x006\x000\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x000\x001\x00', '\x00', '\x006\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x007\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x008\x005\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x000\x007\x00', '\x00', '\x007\x009\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x003\x008\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x001\x000\x00', '\x00', '\x001\x003\x004\x00', '\x00', '\x00']

How do I get rid of all these special characters?

Edit

Based on the suggestion, I modified my code to following:

import numpy as np
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt

file_data = np.genfromtxt("C:\Vikalp\Learning\Machine Learning\Practice\carstopping.txt", usecols=(0,1), skip_header=1, dtype=str)
print(file_data)
x = file_data[:,0]
print(x)

y = file_data[:,1]
print(y)

This is what I get in console:

[['\x004' '\x004']
 ['\x002' '\x005']
 ['\x008' '\x005']
 ..., 
 ['\x001\x003\x008' '\x003\x009']
 ['\x001\x001\x000' '\x004\x000']
 ['\x001\x003\x004' '\x004\x000']]
['\x004' '\x002' '\x008' ..., '\x001\x003\x008' '\x001\x001\x000'
 '\x001\x003\x004']
['\x004' '\x005' '\x005' ..., '\x003\x009' '\x004\x000' '\x004\x000']

Not sure why I am getting all these characters. To get rid of them I included following line:

x = str(x).replace('\\x00','')
y = str(y).replace('\\x00','')

With this I get below output in console:

[['\x004' '\x004']
 ['\x002' '\x005']
 ['\x008' '\x005']
 ..., 
 ['\x001\x003\x008' '\x003\x009']
 ['\x001\x001\x000' '\x004\x000']
 ['\x001\x003\x004' '\x004\x000']]
['4' '2' '8' ..., '138' '110'
 '134']
['4' '5' '5' ..., '39' '40' '40']

So, x and y are now list of strings. Not sure how to convert them to integers. Tried following:

x = list(map(int,x))

Gives this error:

  File "C:\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyder\utils\site\sitecustomize.py", line 880, in runfile
    execfile(filename, namespace)

  File "C:\Anaconda3\lib\site-packages\spyder\utils\site\sitecustomize.py", line 102, in execfile
    exec(compile(f.read(), filename, 'exec'), namespace)

  File "C:/Vikalp/Learning/Machine Learning/Practice/lr_practice_1.py", line 28, in <module>
    x = list(map(int,x))

ValueError: invalid literal for int() with base 10: '['

I have these three issues:

1. How to deal with special characters like /x00 and why are they appearing. Text file seems clean.
2. How to convert list of string to list of int
3. What's the best way to write this code?