The one about online dating

I tried online dating. Let us get right into it.

I had idly toyed with getting into online dating like late last year but I never thought I would actually do it. Moving into my new apartment was what eventually started this domino effect. I started using FaceBook very actively in January to get updates regarding my apartment and one day, I saw a prompt to join FaceBook dating. I scrolled past it because I did not even think people still used FB actively for anything, much less a potential love match.

However, this prompt kept popping up every time I opened my app so I gave in one day and created a profile. I did it and just moved on with my life. I went back to check the app in about 45 mins to an hour and saw that I had over 30 likes on my profile already. My interest was piqued instantly and I started checking out who these people were. That was my first mistake y’all because I should have certainly deleted that app immediately. This is how I was thrown into the chaos that online dating is.

The way FB dating works is that you like someone and if they like you back, it becomes a match. That fateful night, I scrolled through the profiles of people that had liked me and I liked back a few and that is where the drama ensued. The first thing that struck me was how people’s faces didn’t match the ages they claim to be. I had to show my friends and be like, this person is at least 48, why are you lying about being 32?. That is a weird flex.

The next thing I noticed was the way people’s profile were set up. I had set up my profile to meet men strictly so I can only speak to what I saw on men’s profiles. I noticed 3 distinct types of profiles:

Brawn: These guys make up 90% of all the profiles on the app and all the pictures they have up on their profile show them sweating it out in the gym. Dear men of timbre and calibre, please why is this? Care to explain why your entire personality is about being a gym buddy? I found this very weird and made sure to avoid matching with such people. I imagine them telling me not to eat ofada sauce ever again or to start waking up by 5am to run to Hamilton and back just to fit into their perfect date expectation. In the rare cases when I did match with them, I was right because we could be in the middle of a conversation and the guy would say, “gotta hit the gym”. Okay, why are you hitting the gym at 1am? Love and light, Bash Ali.

Brains(hopefully): These guys put up all of their achievements on their profile. Leon Schuster: MBA,Ex- Bain, Investment Banker, Pre-seed Kinikan, Tech Founder, Code Writer, Mandalorian, etc. I honestly do not mind these kinds of profiles too much but then it gives me LinkedIn vibes. How do I know you aren’t lying? Also, why are you telling strangers where you work? There is so much to question but certainly not worth the calories I would have to burn to see it through.

Bants: These guys are my best because their strength lies in their witty profiles. I have a weakness for men with a sense of humour, feel free to judge me. I have found myself navigating more towards profile that catch my attention. The latest I saw was from a Nigerian guy who had something on his profile that read; I know the difference between “am” and “I am”. That cracked me up because knowing the difference is a real struggle for people.

I am going to have to dedicate a section to my lovely African men whose first chat with you in 2023, the year of our Lord still reads like: “Hello “Angle”, Hello Queen, Can I meet you, Carry my baby“. There is a lot to unpack here but I don’t think I should, out of respect for my buddies.

I hesitated to meet so many people in person, a lot of matches probably blocked me for this reason. I was tired of explaining to them that I am a black woman and I do not want to become a statistic in the name of finding love. It is hard to know who wants to meet you genuinely and who has a fetish for dating black women. The first person I met in person is a Nigerian guy and for some reason, I felt a lot more comfortable doing so. I had a chat with my friend about it like last week and she asked if I was worried at the time. I said to her,”how many Nigerians do you know that are serial murderers, especially abroad”? Not a lot, so I do not have the fear of him stuffing me in his trunk after the date. Worst case scenario will be him writing a Twitter thread on how he took out a babe and he had to foot all the $50 dollar bill and someone should stop these broke babes from dating yada yada.

I have only met 3 people on dates from the app and in all honesty, it was not half bad. The real issue is the wild conversations I have had. In no particular order, these are some of strangest I had:

1. I match with someone, he says hi and immediately sends me his number and says “CALL ME”. I cackled so loudly because who the hell is this man and why does he think I will call him. Some men take audacity for breakfast.
2. Matched with a someone who asked me if I had an accent. I ignored the question and moved on to other things, he asks again and then I ask if he has a thing against people with accents. I replied saying everyone has an accent so I am not sure what my expected response should be here. This dude flares up and says, “I only asked because you said you are from Nigeria and this shows your reasoning is pedantic” and goes ahead to block me. This pained me the most because I wish he stayed on to let me school his dumb ass but I never got the chance. It reeks of foolishness when I tell a grown adult I have lived in Nigeria all my life and you ask if I have an accent. I genuinely wanted him to tell me what the benchmark accent all other accents are being measured against so that I can fix up. Oniranu elenu gbigbe.

Online dating is hard. It took me doing this to appreciate how much peace I had being single. It means sometimes dating outside of your race and it takes a lot of being open minded and wanting to genuinely know other people’s culture and finding the sweet spot that works for both of you. I have and still am chatting with men outside of my race and in the rare cases where some of them did know about Nigeria and our food, it was fufu and egusi. I blame these damned Tik-Tok challenges that made this a thing. Fufu is an acquired taste even for Nigerians so who did this?? I wondered briefly if they mostly googled top Nigerian foods and it was fufu that popped up first. Nigerians, Arise!!!. If at all we must make any meal our identity apart from Jollof Rice, why not Amala and Ewedu? Ehn, why not? Please let us all do better in propagating the false gospel of fufu. Not that I hate fufu but come on, Amala is light years ahead of it.

I got distracted by that mini rant but I am back. Online dating is ghetto. It is like being in a constant talking stage with 7 people at the same time, the absolute horror of it all. Bear in mind that this is my experience and there are tons of people that have met their partners on different dating platforms. I obviously cannot write everything that has happened on this journey because of confidentiality but one thing is that you will be having relationship problems without a relationship ????.

There is a positive side to this because I met a friend also via FaceBook but the friendship section of the dating app, which by the way I think is great if you are new to a city just as I am and looking to make friends in your locality. I now have someone who we explore the city together gradually and I am grateful for that. It may be brief in its longevity but I will enjoy the friendship while I still have it. He will read this as well and be glad he made it onto my blog as a VIP, lol.

I tried to cram a lot into this piece and I hope you read it to the end. There will be a part 2 for sure because I am yet to meet the LOML. I used this acronym despite how much I detest its existence. That is what online dating is also about, forging ahead and hoping something beautiful comes out of a mess. When my Queen sang this song, she was onto something. At least with the title, she was.

So dear singles, online dating, will you try it?

PS: For someone that writes, my dating profile is so basic that I am surprised anyone actually matched with me.

*Cover image by Pratik Gupta via Unsplash*