Speed friending gave me hope in a lonely Dhaka

Going out in Dhaka is always limited to two choices: eating out or watching a movie. So, like any normal person, I used to scroll through Instagram and "educate" myself on the most recent brain rot terms. After a few hundred swipes, I came across a post about Flow Fest's Speed Friending event.

Drawing inspiration from speed dating, where singles rotate through short, timed one-to-one chats, hoping brief chemistry sparks a romantic connection, the concept tickled my fancy. A little research explained that speed friending copies speed dating's core mechanic: short, timed one-to-one conversations that rotate around a room, often with a bell and prompt cards to keep things moving. The goal shifts from sparking romance to spotting platonic compatibility.

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In a city where life moves like the chaotic traffic of Bijoy Sarani, with all of my friends now living abroad and the university failing to foster any new friendships, I found myself signing up out of a subtle desperation disguised as curiosity.

So, there I was, notebook in hand (metaphorically, at least), heading into Hiroshi Ramen on Gulshan 1 for the 4:30 PM slot. Nothing in Dhaka starts on time, and Speed Friending was no different. By the time everyone arrived, we were well past the time we had all blocked off.

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The format was explained by the organisers: a shuffle every five minutes, with four rounds in total. The last round lasted 10 minutes. I liked the anonymity. I had no idea who I would end up across from, which was both exciting and unsettling.

Before the first shuffle, someone handed me a questionnaire, which I realised was the real icebreaker: What would you do with a million dollars?

Dream travel destination?

Favourite video game?

What is the best birthday gift you have ever received?

What food would you eat for the rest of your life?

And, to close it out, one wish. Six questions in, and I knew more about the stranger next to me than I do about half my own cousins.

Then the bell rang, and it was on.

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Five minutes is not enough to figure out if you like a stranger, but it is exactly enough to run through the standard Dhaka starter pack: what do you do? Where did you study? Do you know so-and-so?

In round one, I sat across from someone in the supply chain industry who used the full five minutes on container-shipping delays. I nodded along like it was the most fascinating subject in the world, mostly because there was nowhere else to look.

Round two went better. Two minutes in, the woman across from me mentioned she had torn her meniscus, almost the same freaky way I tore mine, doing exactly what enthusiastic amateurs do on a Friday evening.

What followed was five minutes of comparing how we broke our bones, and somehow it counted as a genuine connection. Forget the million-dollar question; nothing bonds two strangers in this city faster than a shared injury. Even the orthopaedic kind. Trauma bonding at its finest!

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By the time the ten-minute finale rolled around, I had gone from bracing myself to actually looking forward to it. This one was with a microbiologist.

We got onto environmental concerns almost immediately. I am an environmental science student, so I had opinions ready. Trying to build a bridge, I mentioned I had taken a microbiology course myself.

Wrong move!

Somewhere between the polar ice caps and my one course of microbiology, I told her that I had used AI to build my blog, and the temperature dropped several degrees. She was firmly anti-AI, and for the rest of the round, I was on the back foot, defending myself more than I was making a new friend.

But I liked talking to her nevertheless; she probably was the most fun one.

Walking out, I think I made some new connections, be it over my use of AI or that I am not the only one with freak accidents.

A few Instagram follow requests later, I did start texting with a few people I met. Not friendship as I once knew it, but in a Dhaka full of absent friends, it will do more than enough.

Photo: Courtesy