About three weeks ago, still ⚡ HIGH ⚡ on my positive experience with two Catalan language exchanges on Skype/Zoom I had had with people I follow on Twitter during the #40h7dLC, I decided I wanted MORE.

Still high?

And wanting more?

Language addiction it is. But one that’s healthy for the brain 🧠 (or so I’d like to think); way healthier than my coffee ☕ (perks of being married to an 🇮🇹) and chocolate 🍫 (perks of being 🇧🇪) addiction.

And so I downloaded Tandem and this is what has happened:

1️⃣ Some 50 people have sent me messages, which is more than I could handle to be honest. I’m trying to be a nice gay… erm… guy and respond to everyone who sends me a message. As a result, I haven’t yet reached out to anyone myself.

2️⃣ I’m very popular in 🇧🇷: 90% (‼️) were gay guys 🏳️‍🌈 from the country of Samba (de Janeiro).

3️⃣ Many guys have half nude pictures on their profile, and some have only those. Wrong app I’d say. I have photos of my 🐾 dogs 🐾 and me.

4️⃣ Probably related to the aforementioned: I got a request to exchange pictures I wouldn’t send to my mother and one guy told me what activities he would like to perform with me 😳 (again nothing I’d share with my mother).

5️⃣ Most of my conversations (I’d say 90%) where in English. I don’t mind speaking 🇬🇧 and helping/correcting others, but the return on time investment was rather low.

6️⃣ Many conversations weren’t leading anywhere (lack of interest, not much in common, extreme slow response) or simply died down 🧟 after a few messages. Though one conversation with a 🇧🇷 bloke went well enough to exchange ☎️ numbers and a 🇿🇦 guy does seem to be turning into a stable conversation partner.

7️⃣ But I was aiming for video calls and finally a few days ago Zoomed up with a 🇪🇸 lady living in 🇩🇪 to have a Dutch-Catalan exchange and we’ve planned another exchange for next weekend. So that’s a success 🙌 story.

My conclusion

I still have some conversations going (or dragging on depending on my conversation partner), but without the only real exchange I have had it would have been a bit disappointing as result. I did spend a lot of time on the app and tried to respond asap 🚀 but not many people seem to want to be on the app for longer language exchanges. Maybe my expectations were to high or I am reaching a conclusion too fast. For now the app remains on my phone but I might spend less time on it and respond not as quick as I used to do.