🎃In a dimly lit, smokey lounge bar, Madhuri sat across from a gentleman on the couch. Their giggles were tuned out by the techno sounds playing as ambient music. She nervously twirled her hair, reciprocated by him rubbing his hands together. Their conversation flowed from her possibly designing an outfit for him to how she likes dancing in her room alone and her experience of her first-ever solo trip to Goa. Unless you joined them at their table, you would never know—they were both blindfolded with a crimson satin cloth.
🍌At Dirty Rabbit in Kailash Colony Market, Delhi, they are attending a ‘Strangers Meet’—a trend that is catching up in metro cities where more and more people are finding themselves lonely despite being in an ocean full of people and possibilities. Such meet-ups bring together people who do not know each other but wish to socialise, make friends or build connections.
🥀The 38-year-old fashion designer was attending the meetup for a third time. She and her childhood friends have now drifted apart, each busy with their family and careers. “There is nobody to talk to. I have come here to find some friends and build new relationships,” she says.
🍌The tables adjacent to Madhuri’s were occupied by similar pairs, with eyes forced shut, they interacted with the stranger before them—or not. Across one table, sat two middle-aged men in absolute silence. The quiet was occasionally broken by them slurping on their blue-coloured minty lemonade. At another table, a man narrates to a young marketing executive, his recent trip to Prayagraj for Kumbh and yearly trips to Vaishno Devi. The timer goes off.
﷽The hosts of the Strangers Meet announce to the participants their two minutes are up. They guide the blindfolded guests, carefully seating them in front of a new stranger. Somehow, amidst the shuffle, Madhuri’s turn to shift goes amiss.
༒She continued chatting, sharing how she was occupied with expanding her jewellery business, admitting that this was her first time stepping out of her house in two months. “High five!” he announced, holding out his palm. “When I was preparing for MBBS, I wasn’t socialising. I became quite introverted. Now that I’ve been selected, I’m trying to do all the things I wanted to do earlier,” he disclosed. “I can’t find your hand to high-five,” he said, inching his palm forward. She chuckled and said: “I never reached out.”
🧸When asked if they would become friends, she said: “Maybe we’ll talk once or twice, but I don’t think it will continue. My schedule is about to get busy. And he won’t have time either—he is about to become a doctor.” She noticed the confusion and clarified: “Actually, I don’t want to invest too much in people anymore. I have faced too many setbacks. At this age, mustering up the courage again and again is really difficult.”
ꦺHer justification was met with a rebuttal: “If you are not open to something, how will it come to you?” She replied: “I have been open all this while. But now I feel like all the energy and time I have wasted crying over people leaving, if I invest that in myself and my work, I will grow a hundred times more.”
🗹Many think events like stranger meetups, speed friending and speed dating are antidotes to the loneliness experienced in the virtual world of dating apps and social media where connections and interactions are fleeting. But the idea of building meaningful connections and the time spent to build them has been pitted as separate from our self-growth, yet somehow, our career has made it to the checklist. Until this understanding of investing in self as separate from investing in others is not eliminated, such in-person events will remain an extension of the virtual spaces—momentary.
ܫAt the same lounge bar, after the Strangers Meet concluded, tables on the terrace were being set for Small World to host a Speed Dating event. Upon arrival, there were only two women in sight. Rehan, 25, who downloaded Tinder once but “just couldn’t understand it, so uninstalled it”, was one of the seven male participants. His enthusiasm to talk aamne saamne with people did not die down despite the low turnout.
༒When asked why loneliness has become a growing issue, he says: “There’s always this fear of rejection. There are three girls in that corner. Do you see the girl in the blue sweater? I want to approach her.” He abruptly stands up from his seat, straightens his shirt and asks: “What do you think, can I get her number? How am I looking today?” His nervousness was reciprocated with encouragement: “If you don’t approach her, you will never know.”
Humans are hard-wired to connect. But social anxiety gets in the way of them living the lives they want to live.
🔯At two different tables, the two women sat as the suitors rotated between them, each getting less than five minutes to make an impression. The girl in the blue sweater was a friend of one of the participants. Rehan was trying to muster the courage to approach her when he flagged: “I guess I have missed my chance, she is leaving.” He was not to be seen shortly after.
ꦿAccording to Fallon R Goodman, Assistant Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at George Washington University, humans are hard-wired to connect with each other. But social anxiety gets in the way of people living the lives they want to live. At its core, Goodman said, it is tied to the fear of rejection. This fear essentially attempts to protect a person from loneliness and isolation that may be a result of rejection, but paradoxically, it makes one lonelier.
🃏Even before entering Whiz Cafe X ThaiFuze, a peek inside through the windows signalled a full house for the board gaming event organised by the South Delhi Meetup Community (SDMC). Each table had at least eight members engrossed in playing the chosen game selected from the pile. The gamers only looked up to ask if you were interested in joining, but other than that, they were in their worlds—some finding and stopping Hitler and a fascist takeover.
༺As they played, Shivani, 29, a lawyer, went around clicking pictures—capturing moments at the cafe one last time before it shut down permanently. Not very tall, she stood on her toes to fit as much into her frame as possible. She is one of the earliest members of the community. She joined SDMC in 2021 when it was still Boardgamers of Delhi. Over the last three years, the community expanded beyond boardgames to include a frisbee club, art and craft club, and book and prose club, among others.
💧When asked to share how being a part of this community impacted her life, she shared: “I am neurodivergent—I have ADHD—and I discovered people with ADHD in the community. The funny thing is, my diagnosis came a year after joining the community, but I realised why I loved board gaming as an activity. It is stimulating; it allows me to think, it helps me stop my thoughts, get out of my body and be more present.”
𓂃At a nearby table, a girl accuses another player of being the secret Hitler with a solid effort to convince the other participants to check her role card. The accused, however, remains calm and disputes the opposition’s claims. Most of them were playing together for the first time, but the absence of formality suggested otherwise.
꧅Shivani continues after the brief disruption and says: “There are two-three people from the community who are my friends and are also neurodivergent. It was so amazing to get to know them because I ended up having very open conversations with them—whether it was about medication, therapy, or their general struggles. I remember this specific conversation about how we struggle with time and my struggle with organisation,” she adds.
🍨How board games or sports meetups are set up is quite different from how stranger meetups and speed dating are set up. The focus of game meetups is the ‘self’, one becomes attuned to their mind and body, thinking about the next steps and moves. The social mixer events focus on the ‘other’ instead. ‘What are others thinking of me?’ ‘Am I in the right place?’ ‘Who will break the ice?’ ‘How do I approach them?’ Not to say these questions don’t pop up during other social events, but activities provide an anchor that leads participants back to themselves.
🍎Earlier that morning, 22 kms away, in North Delhi, Xcited organised a sports meetup at Smashing Arena. Like SDMC, they are a community open to registered members. The participants walked in, wearing cotton and synthetic jerseys, some armed with rackets and a few others adorned with headbands.
💯Sparsh, 21, had registered for the community a week before the meetup. To his luck, the first event was a sports meetup, and he couldn’t get more comfortable because most of the friends he made in his childhood were people he played sports with. When asked why he joined the community, he explained: “My girlfriend recommended that we join this because although we are dating, we need good company and we need friends. Usually what happens is that the people we call friends are people we work with or study with; we don’t connect with them. I don’t want to force friendships with people. I actually want to find people that I could connect with.”
❀With events revolving around socialising with strangers or mixing with new people, one of the biggest misconceptions is people are only looking to find a romantic connection. Movies have for so long sold the idea of a chance meetup and romantic love that the importance of connection with like-minded people has been widely sidelined.
🀅During the second wave of COVID, he left social media. Sensing the unlikeliness of a Gen-Z’s decision to leave social media, he elaborated: “I feel it is an artificial platform. I have met people who have two different personalities. I find them very cool on social media, but when I meet them, they don’t have those social skills that they seem to possess on social media.”
꧑The virtual interactions on social media provide a false sense of “friendships”. The concept of offline meet-ups is a step towards forming meaningful bonds—providing a faint hope amidst the loneliness epidemic.
(This article appeared in Outlook’s Valentine’s Day 2025 special issue on love and loneliness in an era of technology.)
(This appeared in print as 'Friendship Loveship Hateship')
