Berlin is the least self-conscious board on the site. Couples describe the arrangement the way other people describe a shared calendar, and nobody writes a paragraph apologising for it first. Old flats with real rooms and long leases mean hosting at home is normal rather than a logistical feat, which removes the thing most of these boards spend their energy on. A large share of the people posting arrived in the last few years and will leave again, and a fair number of couples say openly that they prefer it that way.
Posts come from Kreuzberg, Neukölln, Prenzlauer Berg, Friedrichshain and the western districts.
People say which side they are on early, because it decides who can realistically meet.
How the board is run
A post lands on a city board because the person who wrote it said they were somewhere near Berlin,
and that is the whole of what the city tells you. It is a reading board rather than a list
of people nearby. Everything on it is anonymous: no names, email addresses, phone numbers,
messaging handles, external profiles or photographs are published here, and none are asked
for. Nothing is for hire, so anything with a price on it comes off, as does anything
describing somebody who did not write it. Posts run for six weeks and then retire, and
each carries a flag. Posting and replying for real both happen through the connected
platform, where you decide what you share and when.
Couple seeking in Berlin
A couple looking for a third, together and on the same page.
Since we started keeping track, sixty one men have written to us. Nineteen got a reply. Eleven were still writing after a fortnight. Six reached the sixth week, which is when we suggest meeting. Two became arrangements. We publish that because men consistently assume the drop off is us being difficult, and it is mostly not us at all.
Kreuzberg·Four years open. Two arrangements out of a great many conversations.·
Looking for somebody who will still be writing in week ten
We told our friends four years ago, one at a time, over about six months. Most were fine in a way that was almost anticlimactic. Two became noticeably closer to us afterwards. One woman we had known for eleven years went quiet, then formal, then absent, and that is permanent now, and we still miss her.
Friedrichshain·Six years open, out to our whole circle for four of them.·
Looking for somebody who does not need to be kept out of sight
Nine years ago I spent four months seeing a woman who told me her husband knew about it. He did not. I found out in the way you would expect, badly and in public, and the part I still turn over is that I had never once tried to check, because checking felt insulting and was easier not to do.
Prenzlauer Berg·Eleven years. One of them turned out to be somebody else's lie.·
Looking for a couple where both people can tell me the same story
Most of the messages I receive are addressed to a type. They arrive with the assumptions already fitted: what I am like, what I want, how I behave, what sort of presence I am supposed to be in a room. A few are flattering. Almost none of them are about me, and I have grown tired of being the blank space the assumptions get written onto.
the western districts·Eight years, three arrangements, many messages meant for somebody else.·
Looking for somebody writing to me rather than to an idea
We were closed for fifteen years and then we were not, and what people find unsatisfying is that nothing happened. There was no affair, no crisis, no dead patch anybody was trying to repair. We were happy and we still are. It came out of a long conversation on a train about what each of us thought we had given up, and then about a year of talking, and then this.
the western districts·Twenty three years married. Two years open. No drama behind either.·
Looking for somebody unbothered by two people who took a very long run up
English is my third language and this board runs in it, so my messages are short, direct and grammatically careful. I have twice been told that I seem cold. I am not cold. I am working, the working is invisible, and what arrives at your end is a woman who writes like a form that needs filling in.
Neukölln·Three years in this, all of it in my third language.·
Looking for somebody who does not confuse fluency with warmth
The first message almost always contains the same question, sometimes politely and sometimes not: where will he be, and is he watching. He is not. He has never wanted to be. If you told him it was a requirement he would laugh, and then he would take his book to the other end of the flat.
Prenzlauer Berg·Eight years, four people, and the same misunderstanding every time.·
Looking for a man who has read the second paragraph properly
I walk for two or three hours most Sundays and I have done it alone since my oldest friend died. What I miss is not the exercise. It is the particular conversation you have while walking, where nobody is looking at anybody, difficult subjects come out sideways, and then get dropped again without ceremony.
Prenzlauer Berg·Twenty six years open. Retired, unhurried, and short of company.·
Looking for a walking companion who knows, and nothing more than that
Post your own in Berlin
The board does the reading half. A post of your own, read by people who are actually near
you, goes on the platform this site connects to, and you decide what is in it.
For a post at full length, the hand-written ones on the main board run longer than a board
entry ever does: a couple asking for one careful conversation, a single man in no hurry at all, and a hotwife searching with her husband beside her.
The other cities
The board runs in 21 cities, and each one reads its own way.