Tinder Swap
Two friends set each other up on blind Tinder dates in hopes of finding the perfect match.
By Martina Barrera-Hernandez and Trevor Bohatch
THE RULES:
- Only meet in public places.
- No oldies or NU students.
- Stay off your own account.
- Send picture and conversation with date one hour before.
Martina
DATE #1: THE BODY BUILDER
Well whatever I thought my type was, this guy was pretty much the exact opposite. He is a bodybuilder – he even showed me competition shots of him all oiled up posing in a speedo. What more could a girl ask for on a first date? We had zero chemistry and the conversation was like pulling teeth – just when I thought I couldn’t hang out with him for another minute, I remembered that I had just finished recruitment and had been trained to hold awkward conversations with strangers and get into the ~deep zone~: “Tell me about your family,” I asked. “What do you love about bodybuilding?” To make matters worse, we met up at Sherbucks (seriously, Trevor, why?) and every other person who walked in knew me. One of my PA kids came over to give me a hug and immediately noticed the bulk of muscle sitting to my right. Swipe left, sorry dude.
DATE #2: THE CUTIE
The idea of having to go on another date sent me into an oblivion of existential angst – Who am I? What is Martina? What is the meaning of life? I begrudgingly threw on a flannel and dragged myself to Peet’s and was met by a green-eyed cutie. He originally wanted to be a high school history teacher, but is now training to become a police officer because he has two younger sisters and wants women to feel safe. OKAY TAKE ME NOW SWIPE RIGHT SWIPE RIGHT. While I don’t think I would’ve picked him out for myself or met up with him if not for the sake of #journalism, I’m really glad I did. We even went out a second time. Who knows? Maybe by the time you’re reading this we’ll be honeymooning in Paris.
DATE #3: THE TRAVELER
I was a little nervous for this one because I knew he was a 10/10 from the pictures Trevor sent me from his profile before the date. We met up at Peet’s (his pick too, points for being a Peet’s guy) and ended up talking for two hours about our travel experiences and his upcoming year abroad. He was incredibly well-dressed, listened to my rant about loving the dentist, and Jewish (this one’s for you, grandma), but he definitely clued into the fact that the person he was sitting with was not the same person who messaged him to grab coffee. Trevor and I are polar opposites over messaging, and my date called me out on it. Apparently that didn’t phase him at all, because we also went out a second time (look at that 2 points for Trevor). Catch me on the next season of The Bachelorette. Date #3, will you accept this rose?
Trevor
DATE #1: THE BESTIE
“Don’t set me up with some boring, senile guy,” I told Martina and one of her best friends at a birthday party the night before my first date. Little did I know her best friend (yes, the one that was standing with us) was my date. We met at Patisserie Coralie the next morning and I proceeded to apologize profusely, caught red- handed on the first date. But he was really cool about it. We talked for almost an hour and a half at random and never really ran out of things to say, which was refreshing. This was a good start. As he runs in the same circles as me on campus, I definitely wouldn’t have pulled the trigger on this one (that’s one of my rules), but I’m really glad Martina did!
DATE #2: THE HIGH SCHOOLER
It was a cold, windy Friday night – 12-year-olds were sitting next to me taking duckface selfies with their Andy’s custards while a dad announced to the entire store that it was his daughter’s birthday and that everyone should sing along. That’s when I knew this was about to be the worst. Having pulled an all-nighter the night before the date, I was truly not in the mood to make small talk or pretend I was interested in anything except returning to the luxury that is a Bobb double – especially when he was 45 minutes late, but I decided to try and persevere. There was just no chemistry. We talked about high school for the majority of the date, which made me want to take the dull spoon out of his concrete and push it into my eyeball.
DATE #3: THE HOT HUNGARIAN
“Is this your first time meeting up with someone from Tinder?” he asked in a beautiful Hungarian accent. “Yes,” I replied and stared off into space like the liar I am. If we get married, our entire relationship will be based off deceit. He was so nervous, but that kind of made him even more endearing. He was perfect – looks and brains! He is studying at a local college and planning to become a physician. We talked pretty casually about travel and what brought him to America. He also took an hour long train to come see me, which was really sweet, then missed the one back home and had to Uber. We saw each other for dinner a second time and have plans for a third. Moral of the story: I should stop dating Americans.