Speed Dating and the Brooklyn Bridge

The past week has been eventful, to the say the very least. On Thursday night a friend and I went speed dating on the Lower East Side. It was your typical speed dating set up (not that I had ever done it before... but it's what it looks like on TV and in movies...), rows of tables and the guys move and I just got to sit there and go on 16 mini dates in about an hour. Each date was 3 minutes long, and for some people 3 minutes goes by really quickly, and for some... it seems like 3 hours of torture. At the end of the 3 minute, the host rings a gong (it was at a bar called China One - I guess they wanted to stick with the theme) and the guys move up one seat. There is also a paper to write everyone's name on and some short notes to help you remember them later when it was time to make the selections.

I have a hard time remember all of the details, but I will do the best I can for each of my dates.

#1 - My notes for this guy were: Ireland. I got to speak with this guy the longest, because he sat down at the table and we started talking before the event officially began. He was nice, foreign (which seemed to be the underlying theme for the night), and seemed like a good guy. It was a good way to start the night.

#2 - Notes: Dr. Brooklyn Heights. So he was a doctor who lived in Brooklyn Heights. Also foreign, from India. I found on this date that it was going to be hard to hear my dates. Yes, they were sitting right across from me, but I was at a table that had another girl sitting directly next to me (with no space in between), so her conversation kept filtering through, and it was just generally loud at this place. So the Dr. from BK Heights was nice, but I had to keep asking him to repeat himself.

#3 - Notes: Financial District. I'm not sure why these are my notes for this guy. I know he lives there now, but it really doesn't tell me much else. I remember that he was from Georgia, and he would have been really cute, except he had this crazy thing going on with his hair. It was straight, and longish parted down the middle and kind of pushed back off his face. It was weird, but other than that, he was probably one of the best looking guys there... which doesn't say too much.

#4 - Notes: dog/beagle/code. I had a hard time remembering this date afterwards when I was hashing out details with my friend. He was her last date, and she thought he was the absolute worst. I'd have to disagree, only because the one after him (my friends 1st date) was by far my worst. So this guy was boring, and clearly older than the age limit (the age of the event was 22-30). He talked about his job which is writing code. I clearly don't know much about that and was bored so I tried to change the subject. I asked him what he does outside of work (which I will clarify that I only asked this as a save question because the worst question all the guys could ask me was "what do you do for fun" because it's such a lame question.), so date #4 told me that he likes to borrow his parents dog, which is a beagle, and take him out in the city and to the park. This date seemed longer than 3 minutes. I was grateful for the gong, but I had no idea what was coming next.

#5 - Notes: surfing/college. The first thing this guy says when he sits down is, "I think you're too old for me." What? I ask him repeat what he just said, just to be sure I heard correctly. Sure enough. I'm too old. Now, I'm right in the middle of the age bracket of the group, so I would have thought this guy would have expected to meet women older than him... being that he was 22. Yes, definitely too young for me. I have a hard time thinking about dating someone who is 25, let alone a 22 year old. I gathered from our conversation that he was not the brightest bulb, and he actually was probably a little bit slow. He talked about how he's in school for engineering (yet, he told my friend something completely different), and that he likes to surf. Whenever I thought 3 minutes should be up, it wasn't. And I just kept thinking that I've been on longer dates than this that were probably just as bad, I can do this... It's just 3 minutes. Finally the host rang the gong, and the longest 3 minutes of my life were over.

#6 - Notes: trucks/? 2nd time. After the last date, anything would have been a welcome relief. This guy sat down, and he was nice enough. He reminded me however a lot of D, physically and in his actions. He told me that he works in transportation because when he was growing up he was obsessed with trucks and trains and things like that. Interesting... It also was his second time doing speed dating. I don't really remember much else about the 3 minutes.

#7 - Notes: none. I did not write a single thing down about this guy. I had a really really hard time hearing him. It turns out, he's from Peru (my friend found this out - not me) and had I known this, I would have had plenty to talk to him about. I couldn't hear a word he said, and he was really awkward and shy. He kept talking down towards the table which made it even worse.

#8 - Notes: Study/. When this guy sat down, he had his paper that he was taking notes on in front of him. He had been talking to a girl before the event began, and on his notes (yes, I looked) he had written "cool chick" and underlined it a few times and drew hearts next to it. He also had the Yes box boldly checked. It was pretty funny, just to see a guy's notes with hearts and stuff drawn on it. We talked pretty much about the psychology of speed dating, and he thinks that most matches come from the very beginning of the night, because after a while you are just exhausted and noone seems appealing. He might be right, the dates did seem wear on you as the night continued. I didn't find out anything about him. That was all we talked about, I think.

#9 - Notes: Finland. When a guy was foreign, I really took to writing down where they were from. This guy was cute, he works for the diplomacy for Finland. He's a political advisor to an ambassador. We talked about Finland and how in the summer it's light 24 hours a day, and in the winter there are months without sunlight at all. I couldn't imagine that. I think that must be the most depressing place to live if there is no sunlight for months at a time. We talked about that for a while, and we talked about teaching some. He was nice, but there was not much of a connection there. An easy 3 minutes, but not someone I'd date again.

#10 - Notes: Concerts. This guy was from Barcelona, and did not speak English very well at all. Besides being hard to hear him, it was hard to understand him even when I could hear him. We ended up talking a lot about concerts and good places to see live music in the city. He must not have been living here for very long, I did ask him... but I couldn't make out his answer, and he had repeated himself so many times prior to that, I couldn't ask him to repeat himself again. So we talked about music and concerts, and he seemed generally clueless about most things musical in the city. From what I could tell, he likes 90s pop rock, and wants to find places that play that type of music live. I told him his best bets were on the LES and in Williamsburg.

#11 - Notes: None. This guy was the last guy before our half-way break. I remember what he looks like. I don't remember what we talked about. Not even a little bit. My friend told me that he was from Russia. I know we didn't talk about that. There was nothing memorable about this guy.

---- Break ---- We had a 15 minute break in which to use the bathroom, get more drinks, stretch, and they served a tray of Chinese food. I didn't have any because I had eaten before and wasn't feeling particularly hungry at that point. It was also a good chance to talk with some of the people you didn't get to talk much with during your 3 minutes. My friend was still talking to her last date, someone I had not yet met, so I went over there, and the first thing my friend says to him is, "Oh this is my friend - she went to Rutgers too." So, this guy was a Rutgers engineering graduate, so we talked about that for a little. He just kept saying that he missed being at New Brunswick and he goes back there almost every weekend. I also talked to my first date (the Irish guy) for a little bit during the break, I think I felt more comfortable talking to him because I already knew more about him.

#12 - Notes: Willsburg. This was my abbreviation for Williamsburg, where he lives. After the break, my 12th date comes to the table with not one, but two drinks in his hand. I look at the two drinks suspiciously, and he says, "well you have to be prepared." He was really nice, and we talked about everything from being a librarian to his work as an animator, to him living in Williamsburg. He looks like he lives in Williamsburg... black plastic glasses, messy hair, selectively mismatched clothing. I probably could have guessed his residence before he told me. Either he did not hear the gong after the 3 minutes were up, or he was having such a good time he didn't want to leave, but the next date was hoovering over his chair and I had to remind this one that he had to move on.

#13 - Notes: Hoboken. This guy was from India, living in Hoboken. His accent though was so strong that I had a hard time understanding "hoboken". He also was wearing colored contacts which was the freakiest thing ever. I don't think I've ever seen a guy with colored contacts on, I have seen many girls with them, and they can look good, but this guy creeped me out with the fake blue eyes. I don't remember what we talked about, I was pretty tired at this point and wouldn't have minded skipping my last 3 dates all together.

#14 - Notes: ER Dr. This guy was old, much older than 30, or at least he looked it. He looked A LOT like the Finnish guy (Date #9) and it was actually kind of hard to tell them apart. Despite having a foreign sounding name, he was American, and just finishing his residency as an ER doctor. He was nice if not a little boring, but it was fine. By this point I felt like I had the same conversation so many times over again, I was boring myself.

#15 - Notes: Rutgers. The guy I had talked to over the break. We talked more about Rutgers and the campus and living in New Brunswick in general. He now lives in Jersey City, but doesn't really like it - and desperately misses New Brunswick. He was originally from India, and we talked about that for a while. There was no real connection, just enough common ground to fill 3 minutes worth of time.

#16 - Notes: None. My last date. This guy was a friend of the Williamsburg guy (date #12), and his friend had bought him the ticket to speed dating for his Christmas present. A strange gift, but maybe he was really lonely. It's been a while since Christmas though... Anyway, we talked about his friend for a bit (who somehow had messed up the rotation, and missed 2 of his dates, and was over by the food, eating). We did the usual talk, where we were each from (he was from LA), what we did for a living, blah blah blah. It was not a bad 3 minutes, but after 16 times, I was just ready to be done.

Finally when it was all over, my friend and I hung out for a bit so I could finish my drink, then headed over to the Life Cafe with her sister to eat dinner and hash out the evening's dates. We agreed on the weirdness of most of the guys, and that the Williamsburg guy had the best energy. I liked him the most of all my dates. I don't know if I will do this again, it was so tiring, but we did we'd go again for free, if the situation arose.

Yesterday, I took my students to the Brooklyn Bridge. The Israeli came with. 6 of my students have now met the Israeli, and it was a bit awkward but it was a really fun trip. On the subway ride back (the Israeli stayed in the city to meet up with his mom and brother), one of my students asked me why I didn't have any kids. I told her I didn't know, and that someday I would. She said to me that I'm going to make a really excellent mother (which was by far the nicest thing a student has ever said to me), and I should have kids soon. I said that I hadn't met the right guy right and when I did, I would have kids. She said, "what about... oh never mind." I replied, "what? what about the Israeli?" I explained that he was going back to Israel very soon, so she said, "Why don't you move to Israeli with him?" I just explained as best I could that I had no interest in moving to Israel, and someday I will meet a guy who lives in America, who I will have kids with. It was the strangest conversation I've ever had with a student, and slightly unnerving. It's amazing how perceptive kids are... and how straight forward.