London Speed Dating

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A few weeks back the topic of speed dating came up in conversation with Erin's Mum about how hilarious it was for her, and of course we decided to actually do it. So last night we went to a posho wine and champagne bar called Amuse Bouche in Soho with our alias': Erin would be Betty the Butcher and I would be Fran the Fish Monger, just in case we weren't feelin' it...

However, once we got there we got little name tags and numbers so Betty and Fran went right into the bin! Realizing the predicament we were in, we got our abnormally massive glasses of wine to help ease us into the ridiculouslness we were about to encounter and went downstairs to check out the setup....definitely not what we anticipated. I always pictured speed dating with "couples" set separately and people sitting across from each other with a table in between them as a buffer. Not at Amuse Bouche...here there were no tables just sofas and chairs and even a little secluded corner in the back that we dubbed the love corner, all of which you had to share with other chatting "couples".

Upon the initial survey of the participants, we realized the girls were awesome and the guys were absolute duds. Moreover, we chose this particular event because the age range was said to be 23-30 years old, but after scoping out our prospects we realized we were in for a ridiculous treat of a few 40-50 somethings. I mean come on, you could at least dye your hair if you're trying to fake it...

Nonetheless, we carried on and took our places around the dimly-lit room--luckily neither Erin nor I got the love corner in the back...definitely too close for comfort. Ding! and the 4 minute rounds began. I didn't know what I was going to say to a stranger in only 4 minutes, but #3 Jules took the onus and started asking me questions. You would think that 4 minutes is a short amount of time, but you'd be surprised how long those 4 minutes can be when you're chatting with someone you're not really liking or is making you feel uncomfortable. Ding! and #2 Juan took his place across from me for the next 4 minutes. I thought he would be better until I got his spit-fire of questions at lightening speed. Clearly he thought 4 minutes was not enough time when he wanted to know my whole life story. Ding! phew #1 Jason Ding! #11 Shashank Ding! #10 Demian Ding! much needed 10 minute break to get another bucket of wine and catch up with my sofa-mate, Nazia, about her thoughts about the prospects. Hilarious girl--the guys honestly had a much better pool of candidates to choose from than us ladies....

Second round was more hilarious with the wine slowly going to my head and the guys sitting across from me becoming more and more ridiculous...like #9 Ian, for example, who could have easily been my dad and sounded like a woman. Nonetheless, the night ended above my expectations, which mind you were pretty low coming into it. I ticked 2 "Yes's" and the rest "No's", which is more yes's than I thought I would tick. But Erin and I left having made friends with Nazia and her housemate, Richard, so it was still fun and definitely not a total bust.

The best part was the trip home with Erin recapping all the crazies we talked to for the past 2 hours. Final thought on speed dating: we need to choose an age range of 12-20 so we get to meet people remotely close to their 20s, but still expect to meet cool girls and total duds. A fun Tuesday night I must say, even with all the duds.

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Comments

[anonymous]

maybe if you did the older range, you would have got guys your age.. i mean don't all people want to be older? and all the old men want the young girls so ... mmm ewwwww....