That Week I Was A Tinder Whore in Berlin

Any way you slice it, modern dating is difficult. How do I define modern? Mostly it’s characterized by the digital takeover of romance by websites and apps. But there’s another way in which our time is affecting who we date and who we don’t — globalization. People are moving beyond borders faster and more often than ever before, creating new bumps on the already emotionally disconnected dating landscape. Ipso facto: if there isn’t a language barrier, there will most certainly be a cultural one.

As a straight, female, NYU student, I’ve found great amusement comparing the misguided dating shenanigans of the Big Apple (see Buzzfeed’s flow chart on “romance” at the city school) to those of my study abroad location for the last year — Berlin, Germany. While both metropolises are dominated by the dream to hit it big (not to mention an exploding hipster phenomenon), there are stark differences in the ways people communicate romantically.

Is this dating pool different? Naturally. Is it superior? Not necessarily. While the ratio of men that are straight (along with scharf) is staggeringly higher in Berlin than in New York City, their “game” is hindered by a handful of German clichès.

To compare modern New York City dating with that of what some call the “new, New York,” I turned to Tinder. In my experiment, I swiped right on 50 German guys over one week. The results proved that Germans not only have a language disconnect with social media in general, but they struggle with their, uh . . . moves.

Men expect women to initiate

Upon my arrival in Berlin, I observed that women were expected to make the first move. I found this quirk pretty befuddling. But then I thought that it may be the result of a society where the gender gap is actually closing. That’s a good thing. As it turns out, Germany has the second biggest disparity in pay between men and women in Europe. So really, it’s just bizarre. Through a Tinder lens, this translates to almost no advances from the subjects in question. Out of fifty matches, only fifteen messaged me first.

First movers are still slow movers

But what about when the guy did make the first move, you ask? They proceeded with caution thereafter. An initial reply I received tiptoed around a simple “hello”:

“‘You and Alina like each other’ Woah, looks like Tinder is pretty impatient and skips a lot of steps . . . haha Are we already that far? :P”

It usually takes Germans many weeks, if not months to break initial social barriers (this goes for just friendships too).

Once the ice is broken it’s broken forever

Worth noting, however, is that when a barrier is in fact broken, it will remain this way for life. From this point on, Germans make the most of every conversation and every experience. In their world, opportunities to discuss even the most common of smalltalk topics have a productive nature:

“Hey! So how did you make use of today’s sunny weather?”

Others tried to take the comedic route:

“Ahoy Fräulein! ☺” (or, “Ahoy Miss ☺”)

Germans generally aren’t funny

Germans often try to be funny, but their matter-of-fact manner of speaking (no “ums” or “likes,” ever) in combination with their generally efficient way of life often prevents them from delivering or even enjoying the occasional knee-slapper. That doesn’t mean there aren’t diamonds in the rough though, as demonstrated by one “About Me” section:

“Roses are red, Violets are blue, i hate rhyming, Penis.”

But they are philosophical

Germans tend to express their philosophical tendencies in, once again, the “About Me” section. These 500-character spaces are frequently occupied by poetic quotes about life and love. This aligns with their propensity to plan for the long-term — an ironic practice for Tinder considering that the app is used primarily for hook-ups.

Gems I encountered included:

“The biggest and only goal in life, is to be happy . . . ”

“Tests you can make up, but time with friends you cannot,”

and my personal favorite,

“If growing up was easy, everyone would do it.”

Sexy.

Last but certainly not least, my final finding — that 54% of my matches had liked “How I Met Your Mother” on Facebook — confirmed a plausible reason for it all: they’re learning everything about love from Ted Mosby.