Speed Dating is Pass
The stage is set up in the darkened room of a bar in Delhi, and as the audience cheers, the group of beat boxers begins to perform. It’s a freestyle performance led by a guy in a banker’s shirt and loosened tie, Ajit, who’s also rapping to the music. In the audience, his girlfriend Soumya cheers on. Soumya and Ajit’s paths would never have crossed, had Cupid not played matchmaker in the form of a poetry slam night. One is a full time blogger and a feminist, and the other is a banker who doubles up as a beat boxer in his free time. Ordinarily they would have dismissed each other as “not my type”. But in a bar where they both performed, they discovered that they have much in common.
As in Delhi, in far-off Mumbai, Mingle, a pub quiz geared for singles is on at a bar in the suburbs. Much like speed dating, the idea is to be thrown in the company of strangers for some time and wait for chemistry to do the rest. Unlike speed dating however, there are no awkward, intrusive questions and no pressure to make it work. Instead, there is a whole lot of raucous fun mixed with a chance to test your grey cells and learn something new. If you enter in a group, you will be shuffled and find yourselves amongst strangers on the table. The quizmaster throws a question at the young, single participants:
What is the capital of New Zealand? He shoots the next question, how many sheep are there in New Zealand? The clueless participants laughingly bicker over this one, and already those who did not know each other at the beginning of the evening can start to feel the ice thaw. Evenings such as these in Delhi and Mumbai are common enough, drawing in amateur poets, comedians and performers to showcase their talent.
But they are also doing another great service to singletons, doubling up as hot dating spots. Dating in the city was never as much fun as this. The cultural calendar for Delhi or Mumbai will reveal at a glance, multiple events like stand-up comedy, pub quiz, poetry slam and open mike nights all geared towards networking with interesting new people. A new website has started holding a monthly supper club with a top chef for single people in Mumbai. And dating Coach Vicky Kalwani offers dating tips to men who are looking for help in that department.
Finally, dating has become chic and sexy in India. Rohini Ramnathan, 26, and a radio jockey with Red FM, has been a regular on such alternative entertainment evenings. She even hosts the poetry slam night in Mumbai and says that she has been asked out a million times as these events draw mostly a crowd of single people. “I have seen the most unexpected people lose their inhibitions here. People like bankers and doctors and techies, especially, come and start reciting poetry or doing stand-up comedy, finding in the process a way to vent their ‘nonferrous side’. And believe me women find that particularly irresistible. Most of these events are a great way to network for single people.” She herself has gone out on a couple of dates after being asked out at open mike nights and she says that you find a connection with people.
“These evenings draw like-minded people. Only someone who’s interested in things such as poetry or stand-up comedy would make it on a week night to a bar or club. That automatically translates into an opportunity of meeting someone with common interests, likes and dislikes as you,” she says.
Life in the single lane can be tough to navigate, and the idea of speed dating, matchmaking websites and blind dates can be prickly, to say the least. No wonder these events have taken off so well.
Dating has suddenly become hipper. Though no one says that the events are dating addas, which is precisely the purpose they are solving, looking at the bigger picture.
“You meet someone in a relaxed fun environment like this. The next day you add that person on Facebook or Myspace. Then you meet them again at the same event and things begin to take their natural course,” says Sudeip Nair of Bombay Elektrik Projekt a company that has been spearheading the organising of these alternative entertainment evenings in Delhi and Mumbai. “The speed dating model doesn’t work in India, we’re not culturally comfortable with it. The advantage of these entertainment evenings is that the dating part is not intrusive, it’s subtly weaved in through the many levels of interaction,” he says. He is rather proud of the many success stories of couples getting together after hooking up at events organised by Bombay Elektrik Projekt.
A lifestyle website based out of Mumbai, brownpaperbag. Com has over the last few months being organising a supper club or pop up restaurant event called Turning Tables, where an eminent chef comes and cooks at a subscriber’s home and city folk from different backgrounds are invited to come together and chat over food and wine. The only precondition is that one must come alone.
There is a huge potential to network with new, interesting and like-minded people. We make sure we have people from different professions on our guest list, and then along with wine, conversation flows.
Mitali Sarna, a graphic designer, who has been a regular at the singles pub quiz evenings says: “I have met quite a lot of people here whom I could never have run into anywhere else. The good thing is that half the job of introducing yourself and getting past the first few awkward moments is taken care of automatically. And for the restaurants and bars that play host to such evenings, it really is a win-win situation. As Gaurav Dabrai of Kino 108, a bar in Mumbai which regularly hosts amateur stand-up comedy and pub quiz nights says: “It gives us a chance to expand from our regular client base to many fist timers who turn up out of curiosity.
The footfall increases and the word-of-mouth is great, as everyone has a great time and makes sure to recommend that to friends.” For men who are looking at dating, things couldn’t be better. Vicky Kalwani is a New York-returned dating coach who has started offering his service in Mumbai. Much like Will Smith in the popular movie Hitch, Kalwani has perfected the art of dating and helps his clients to woo the ladies. The qualified date doctor who’s also an entrepreneur has just started his service and already interested men are beating down his door. He offers three courses which include a focus on grooming and conversation skills.
He feels that the time is right for an idea like this to work in Indian cities. “I have all sorts of people coming in, from corporate to even creative people and my job is to gauge their strong points and weak points and work with those.” His one tip to all men while dating? “Avoid pick-up lines at all costs, women hate those, and also work on your personal grooming.” So, farewell to cheesy lines like “do you believe in love at first sight, or should I walk by again?”, and hello cool dating.
