Love is a game and these singles are ready to play.
Tired of passively swiping through apps, millennials are going to extremes to find their perfect match, even if it means traveling across the country to Phoenix, Arizona, for a game show involving balloons.
Singles from California, Rhode Island, Louisiana and New York have flown out of state to take part in the popular YouTube dating series, Pop The Balloon or Find Love, and at least one couple has gotten engaged.
New Yorker Shawn Smith flew over 2,400 miles to the West Coast to find love, believing his future partner couldn’t be in the Big Apple. The Hempstead, New York resident was open to flying across the country because women on the West Coast are “friendlier” and “a breath of fresh air.”“ compared to NYC single ladies.
“I wanted to up my dating game by going on the show and being able to find a match,” Smith, a 27-year-old creative, told The Post.
Luckily for him, spending $600 on a flight was not in vain. Smith joined the show with his girlfriend Taylor, who traveled from Las Vegas, Nevada, in search of a serious relationship.
“The connection felt very real,” Smith said of his month-long love story. “It felt like love and it was something I couldn’t believe was a reality.”
He’s just one of 5,000 singles ages 27 to 42 who are choosing to ditch traditional dating methods and submit applications to be contestants on the viral YouTube series hosted by Arizona resident Arlette Amuli. 28 years old and produced by her husband Bolia Matundu, 31 years old.
Filmed in Phoenix, each 90-minute episode sees contestants line up holding a red balloon for speed dates with a bachelor or bachelorette. If one party doesn’t like what the other person is saying, they can open the balloon to express that they are not interested.
“I have two kids, two boys,” a 30-year-old single hopeful said in a recent episode as she introduced herself. And before she could continue, an uninterested date dramatically burst red balloons.
“I gave it to two children because two are too many”, the 37-year-old explained in his interview afterwards.
Most online dating shows focus on finding love for Gen-Zers, but Matundu and Amuli wanted to help singles in their late 20s, 30s and 40s, many of whom are now parents and looking for love. The pair, who tied the knot in 2021, believe their generation deserves romance, especially since research has shown two-thirds of millennials want to get married.
And while they know their show isn’t a new concept, it does prioritize working-class actors with 9-to-5 jobs and kids looking for a lifelong partner.
“It started with people saying why do these old people go to the show, but now everyone wants to be in the show,“ Matundu, who is a musician, said.
Among the 5,000 applicants Matundu and Amuli screened were mostly women in their late 30s and men in their late 20s.
“We have more women applying. There would be about eight girls and two boys in a report,” said Matundu, noting that they receive over 60 applications a day.
But they noticed that all the candidates wanted the same thing: a committed relationship.
“Most people just want a serious partner. They want people who know how to behave in a relationship,” said Matundu. “We want to get real people coming to the show, knowing they can find real love.”
While millions of subscribers watch the series as a guilty pleasure, real love stories have blossomed, like Smith and his girlfriend Taylor, 23, who is a staff coordinator at a football stadium.
Smith, who is not a long-distance guy, admitted that the relationship is worth thousands of miles apart. “It’s going pretty well so far,” he said.
And he’s not the only East Coaster smitten with West Coast love; Another couple’s romance unfolded on camera and they got engaged after two months of dating.
Mike Braswell, 37, of Newark, Jersey, met his fiancee Nicole “Khe” Akak, 31, a California native, during a June 1 episode.
“It’s 2024. This is an accepted way to meet someone,” Braswell said. “Bolia was sincere in bringing people together who were not wasting people’s time. They’re bringing people together so you can feel them if it’s organic [and] if you have real chemistry.”
Although Braswell and Akaku’s relationship is fresh, the couple knew they were meant to be together.
“At first I was attracted by his aura. He had a strong presence and that’s something I was looking for in a man,” Akak, who goes by her stage name “Khe,” told The Post. “That’s why I was happy that we faced each other.”
The couple, now based in Los Angeles, California, plan to tie the knot within two years of their engagement, which took place on the set of Pop The Balloon or Find Love.
“Once you find the person,” Braswell said of his future wife, “you kind of know.”
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Image Source : nypost.com