FEATURES
Nottingham’s Dating Horror Stories Whenever you’re out and about in Nottingham, you’re bound to spot some loved-up, or extremely awkward, couples on a date. But if you’re scared you’re the only one to ever experience a dating disaster, fear not! Amrit Virdi chatted to students familiar with Notts’ dating scene and uncovered some horrifying yet hilarious anecdotes – all anonymous to avoid the possibility of an exposé, of course. We’re all familiar with MTV’s Catfish: The TV Show. But would you believe one such scenario took place right here in Nottingham? “She looked nothing like the photos, but I couldn’t just tell her to get out.’’ Being catfished was not what this boy expected when he invited a Tinder date to his house – safe to say that they never spoke again… even though she left her charger. “I knew she worked at Greggs, so I dropped it off and ran!’’ And the Tinder troubles don’t stop there. With this particular story happening to my housemate, I had the ‘pleasure’ (I suppose?) of witnessing it unfold firsthand. “I guess the point of the date was to get in my 10,000 steps,’’ he states, reminiscing on the time he agreed to go for a walk with a potential suitor, knowing nothing about him beforehand. “It was most odd, he spent the whole date giving me an in-depth lecture about religion, before belittling me because I didn’t know as much as him.” So, just in case you’ve not been humbled enough by your Moodle feedback, there’s always the chance to be yet further humbled on a date - good to know! “We ended it with a short and sweet: ‘it was nice to meet you,’” he tells me, “then I walked away and never looked back.” “I don’t know what happened,’’ one girl admits, as two-for-one cocktails took a bad turn. “I’m usually good with my drink, but I hadn’t been feeling great that day. So after one cocktail, I ran to the toilet, threw up, and had to go home… it was 8pm.’’ Miraculously, the date in question went on to become her long-term boyfriend, so if that doesn’t instil you with faith that there’s someone for everyone, what will? And the vomiting stories don’t stop there. Another anonymous girl recounts a time when she brought a boy back on New Year’s Eve – only for him to be sick in her toilet… for three consecutive hours. “The first red flag should have been that he asked me to have sex in the library,” I’m told of yet another Tinder trauma. This story goes from 0-100 real quick. “Even when we started speaking, he only sent me videos. It was like we FaceTimed all day every day. But then, ironically, I didn’t hear from him at all on the day we had arranged our first date. I eventually assumed it wasn’t happening… until 7 pm rolls around and he says: ‘I’ve booked Turtle Bay for 8:30 today.’ I’ve never gotten ready so fast in my life – and he barely made an effort! The date was okay until he refused to walk me home at midnight. He then proceeded to ask me over to play Mario Kart every day, even though I repeatedly said no, before sending me the rudest voice note ever. Unsurprisingly, we never spoke again. A word of advice – never date a fresher.’’
By Amrit Virdi Illustrations by Alice Nott Page Design by Chiara Crompton
And people’s hopeful date expectations being scuppered appear to be a running theme. “I’d met him before and I just knew I didn’t want to sleep with him,’’ our final dater confesses. After being an hour late and claiming he got lost when his phone died, even though he lived around the corner, they sat and watched a movie in silence. “I went to the toilet and when I came back, he moved really close to me. I wasn’t into it. He then said, ‘work with me here, what do you want?’. To which I exclaimed, ‘I want you to go!’ We never spoke again… but now he lives in my building.’’ So, if you ever worry that your dating life is a disaster, hopefully, these stories provide some reassurance that you’re far from alone. And after all, it’ll only make it that much better when you do find ‘the one’.
15
