Comet Connections: How are Comets falling in love?

From a shy DM following up on a UTD Bruh Moments post to meeting each other in UNIV1010,

Global business junior Daniel Gomez almost ignored marketing sophomore Ruby Bui on Tinder when he saw her opener, “What’s the best way to hide a body?” But he decided to play along.

“I was watching either Dexter or Breaking Bad, so I was in that sort of mood.” Gomez said. “I texted back with something inspired by it like, ‘pour acid in the bathtub.’” They were intrigued with one another, but Bui wanted to take things slow – so they did for a while, as Gomez slowly won her over.

“He was patient, and he took his time.” Bui said. “He essentially didn’t give up. His initiative was sexy… And he cooked.”

Aziz and Terényi met during the beginning of the pandemic off of a UTD Bruh Moments Instagram post comment and DM. wanted to get to know her.” Terényi said.

Finance graduate Tamara Aziz was looking through the UTD Bruh Moment’s Instagram page when she noticed ITS junior Dániel Terényi for the first time. A caption reading “The bruh moment when UTD students be doing their squats in slides…” accompanied a video of him working out while wearing socks and sandals at the Rec Center. Amused, Aziz commented: “his toes do be breathing tho…”

“Call me a good Bruh Moments Samaritan if you will, but I was almost always one of the first commenters on their posts at the start of the pandemic. I wanted some Bruh points.” Aziz said.

It seemed like it’d be just that – Aziz accumulating her “Bruh points” on the post of Terényi and nothing more. And it was for a couple of months – until Terényi messaged her directly.

“She was cool, laid-back and pretty. And I appreciated how she was actively participating in the Bruh Moments community. I

Aziz, however, wasn’t sure about Terényi’s motives. She’d thought him to be a “stereotypical fuckboy” – but she decided to give it a chance, so they chatted for a while. Recognizing him as an authentic person through their conversations, Aziz became comfortable with Terényi and gave him her number.

“The first time I called her, it was dark because the power was out,” Terényi said. “There was a random sound in the house and I got so scared because I thought it was haunted, so I ringed her up for company and comfort. We started talking every day that entire quarantine summer 2020 after that.”

Interested in each other, Aziz and Terényi decided to finally meet up in-person on the first day of the Fall semester after their classes. Not long afterwards, they began spending every day they could together. During this time, Aziz said she’d come to love Terényi’s strong sense of self and his sturdy moral compass– especially when it came to social justice. And Terényi said he loved how attentive Aziz was – how she was

“someone you could talk to about anything”

– so he took it to the next step.

“I took her out on a quaint little sunset picnic and asked her to be my girlfriend as the sun set.” Terényi said. “It was perfect.”

Since then, they’ve grown even closeradopting a cat, rescuing a dying UTD bunny and making plans to move to the Pacific Northwest to start a rabbit farm in the year and a half they’ve been together. Their Gen-Zness is still ever-present in the way they show care for each other – for example, Terényi will send Aziz bunny videos on Instagram since she’s fond of them, and they’ll both send each other doodles through an art app on their phones to cheer each other up.

“We still comment on Bruh Moment posts but, you know, we’re not as proactive on there anymore,” Terényi said. “It was especially big back then when the pandemic started and we were all inside on our phones, but we have so many other ways we connect now, now that we see each other in person a lot. It’s symbolic though – it’s a really memey ‘UTD-culture-esque’ way we met and we still laugh about it.”

After about half a year doing long-distance, they met up right after last year’s ice storm – and though the ice wasn’t an obstacle at that point, Dorjee’s bashfulness was. While Heller was confident and comfortable talking, Dorjee could barely look him in the eye.

“Cobi was so reassuring though. He definitely helped me come out of my shell,” Dorjee said. “I’m really appreciative. I’ve overcome a lot of my anxiety with him now and our relationship is strong.”

Mechanical engineering alum Sarah Heady and economics alum Cody Damon met in 2016 through a mutual friend in Residence Hall South. When their mutual friend had to leave the University abruptly, Heady and Damon took charge of making sure he got home fine. During the car ride back to campus, they started inquiring about each other’s lives.

“On the last day of winter finals, Cody drove me home, walked me to my door and went, ‘so, my parents and family are going to be in town and they’re going to ask if I have a girlfriend. So, do I have a girlfriend?'” I said yes, obviously.” Heady said.

“It was a place for all us UTD 2024’ grads to connect, and I saw he was from Houston like me,” Loh said. “So I slid into his DMs and asked to be friends.”

Things instantly evolved into romance after their first meeting, and soon they were arranging dinner dates and exchanging recipes and meals while dorming together.

“Food’s been the theme of our relationship the last two years.” Notter said “We derive a lot of fun from it. We’ll eat anything that looks interesting. We’ll cook anything that sounds edible.”

To see their full stories, go to utdmercury.com!

Q: “How did ya’ll officially get together at UTD?”

Taylor: “It was kind of nerdy how it happened. I kind of pushed him into a corner, I was like ‘Yeah, a guy asked me for my number at the Dining Hall today. I didn’t know what to say because I couldn’t tell him I had a boyfriend.’ And he of course started laughing and asked me to be his girlfriend.”