the box that got a girl back together with her ex.
Lockdown 2021. Bangalore→Goa via Bluedart. She opened the box, cried, called her ex. They were back together by sunset. By every measurable outcome except mine, the project succeeded.
tap anywhere for music ↓
hi. you rang. self-portrait, slightly idealised:
Rishabh Balabomma.
29 · between flights · presently unbooked · broke but planning.
i made a website because Bumble didn't have a ‘best friend with feelings’ filter.
scroll down
the song this whole page is asking:
woh ladki hai kahaan?
if it might be you, keep going.
six things she is
- 01Curious.twelve tabs open. always.
- 02Social butterfly.leaves a party with three new numbers.
- 03Ambitious.hopes bigger than the city she's in.
- 04Chatter box.tells every plot twist of her life. side characters and all.
- 05Loved well.her three people call her, and she picks up.
- 06Cute.laughs louder than she expects to.
Two of those just described you? Then this page was written for you.
the part that pretends it doesn't matter. but it does.
LOOKS.
but really
just because you love the ocean doesn't mean you have to drown in it.
i learnt it the hard way.
drag to see the difference. one year between. gym at 6 am, protein, eight hours of sleep. that's the whole thing.
i might not be pretty. but i showed up at 6am for a year to stop drowning. i'll do that for us, too.
receipts
Things I made before I made this page.
two santas, for the two who didn't quit on me that year.
Bad-boss year. Two coworkers held me up - chai at four, cover when i needed it. Office Secret Santa: custom boxes, googly Santa caps, names in Comic Sans (on purpose). They cried. I claim i didn't. The witness statements disagree.
I sketch. I write poems nobody asked for. I shoot videos for friends' birthdays. I build crafts that should not exist. None of it pays. All of it gets given away. I don't know how to not.
from people who weren't real
How I learned what love looks like.
send me a subtitle that broke you. it's a love language.
the honest version
Before you say yes, the receipts.
the page so far was the highlight reel. these are the deleted scenes.
what i bring on day one
i will text first.
Twice as often as you'd like. One good line per six bad. 'Three days' is a rule i was taught and immediately broke. Three days is when i'll text again.
i will cook.
Chicken curry. Poha. Chai. The dal once made a friend cry. He was, in fairness, also having a hard week.
i will notice the small thing.
You'll mention, once, that you can't sleep without water on the bedside. The water will appear. I won't point it out. You'll find it yourself, 2am on a Wednesday.
i will not disappear.
Not after a fight. Not after a lull. Not after a Tuesday where nothing happened. If i go quiet, it's the wifi. Sometimes it's me. I'll say which. The voice note will be long. Reply when you can. No clock.
what i don't know yet
I can't date a stranger. The small-talk muscle in my brain was, somewhere around 2018, replaced with longer-form voice notes. I've asked Hinge matches about the Supreme Court at minute four. None of them called back. Read this whole page. Let it count as our first ninety minutes. The chai, after this, is just the recap.
the part i don't put on the linkedin
Why I'm free.
Ex VP Product. Quit the title.Kept the part that builds things at 2am.Yet broke.
I want to make something worth making.
Something interesting. Something worth building.
took me till twenty-nine and one quit job to figure that out.
next stop · departures board
Bhilaiboarding
Bengalurupossibly
Hyderabador
SFif invited
five people who'd pick up at 3 am
If you don't trust me, ask them.
Two sisters. A brother. Two friends. The version of me at 11 pm, an hour into a fourth chai. Tap any bubble.
they all said yes. it took some convincing.
you have a subtitle that wrecked you. a line from a show, a song, a book. and you've never told anyone it's the truest thing about you.
that's the one i want to know first.
the only filter i'm strict about
“don't come to me until he's stopped renting space.”
i've sat across from someone whose head was in the wrong room. i didn't like it. i don't think you would either.
if you're still drafting fights you won't send, i'm the audience for a play that isn't on.
may you never punish yourself for someone else's inability to see the love in your heart.
okay. lights off for a second.
class four. bhilai. there was a girl.
i wrote her a note in hindi.
then i translated it into english.
in case she preferred english.
i never sent either one.
they're still in a drawer in bhilai.
that was twenty-five years ago.
this page is the third draft.
i'm fully prepared to spend the rest of my life alone,
and actively hoping i won't have to.
the intention. the paper ring.
Other men can buy you vacations.
I can give you this.
i don't know your name yet.
- i'll see when you're hiding.i won't ask. i'll just stay in the room.
- i'll learn your tells.the silence that means "ask me." the silence that means "don't."
- i don't know what you're like at 3am yet.i just want to be the number you call instead of the silence you sit in.
i know. that was a lot of heart. let me be a kid with you for one second.
the algorithm of record, est. 1998
And if your head's still saying maybe.
Hinge spent a decade on machine learning. Bumble raised $580 million. Schoolchildren in 1998 solved this with a pencil and the back of a Camlin notebook. It is, on the available evidence, still the most reliable matchmaking system in India. Enter your name. I've entered mine. The algorithm will tell us where this is going.
+ rishabh
F
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A
M
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peer-reviewed by ten-year-olds. methodologically airtight.
if it lands on Sibling, run it again with your middle name.
that's in the spec.
the last page.
Thank you for reading it.
This page didn't have to be read. You read it anyway. That's the first kindness.
woh ladki hai kahaan · dil chahta hai · 2001
draft 1a note, in Hindinever sent
draft 2the same note, in Englishnever sent
draft 3this whole websitesending…
it took twenty-five years and you to press send.
if it's you, you know it's you.
the cursor's yours now.
the dm is the doorbell. @barish.rao