People are trying to snag dates in airports – here's why you should too
Make the airport your next meet-cute
Lifestyle
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Swap your dating apps for a trip to the airport, says TikTok, and who are we to disagree? Here's why the departures hall could be the site of your next romance.
There’s something about being in an airport that feels ripe with romantic opportunity.
Your bags are packed, you’re emotionally and physically in transit, and the gate to your flight acts as a portal to new experience and possibly even to a new self.
In an airport, you can be anyone you want to be. A chic city girl perhaps, heading home for the holidays with expensive sunglasses on your head, and a monogrammed carry-on bag in your grip.
Or maybe you’ll adopt the persona of a bohemian wanderer, backpack clipped in place around your waist and a pair of filthy Birkenstocks on your feet – unbothered by material possessions, tethered to the real world by your memories of hiking the Inca Trail, which you’ll trade as social currency.
In the airport, your real-world troubles slide into second priority, while perfecting the juggle at security shoots up into first place. It’s a microcosm where rules go out the window, and extreme boredom makes way for harebrained schemes, so it’s no wonder people have decided it’s also a top-tier location for securing a date. And honestly, we kind of understand the logic.
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The term ‘airport hot’ started doing the rounds earlier this year, and refers to a phenomenon where an average-looking person suddenly becomes a 10 just because they’re the only other person your age in that end of the airport.
As evidenced by the millions of views and thousands of videos on TikTok, it’s a universal experience, dubbed the #airportcrush.
Most videos involve women either subtly filming their airport crush du jour sitting unknowingly at their gate, applying urgent glam in a public toilet, or doing beauty prep ahead of time, to ensure they’re primed for reciprocal crushing.
“The whole appeal of an airport crush is that they’re just effortlessly hot,” says Sahana, a TikTok creator who uses the handle @mypawfectfamily. “They’re never wearing much makeup or trying that hard but they still look amazing.”
To recreate the look, she applied henna freckles and lipstick the night before, along with a heatless curling method and brow lamination. The result? A devastatingly pretty ‘natural’ appearance, that has required a hell of a lot of work, but without looking like she’s tried to put herself together at all.
Beauty prep and faux freckles aside, which feels like a lot of work for someone who is usually running late (me), Sahana is not alone in her airport prep. Actually, a lot of young singles have decided the airport is the place to be for romantic run-ins, and are doing the legwork in advance to ensure they’re prime for the pashing.
Of course, they have their detractors. As with any major trend on TikTok, there is a small but loud conglomerate of people who insist these women are insane and need to love themselves more, and focus perhaps on their impending travels rather than snaring a date in Duty Free.
But I disagree. With the dating climate as it is – many young people are giving up on dating apps altogether and are turning to alternative methods to source connection – why not romanticise the hell out of your impending three-hour flight home? Why not lock eyes with a man who is objectively not your type while waiting for an overly-frothed cappuccino, and spend the next hour learning everything you possibly can about him?
In terminal one, the object of your affection can be anyone you want them to be, and you don't have long enough to figure out they don't stack up to lofty expectations. The guy with the cool sneakers isn't still sleeping with his ex, the girl with a New York Yankees cap is experimenting with bisexuality, and the woman heading for the business class lounge doesn't have a family waiting for her at home.
When it comes to locations to meet a potential mate, or even just flirting with the idea of one, I doubt there’s much better than a gate at your home airport.
There’s also something slightly chaotic about airports that feels perfect for a site of romantic inception.
The second you walk into the Duty Free hall, it’s deemed reasonable to spend half your paycheck on barely-discounted perfume that you wouldn’t otherwise want, or stock up on a bottle of Baileys no one in your family will drink. So I say, make an even more reckless investment: go ahead and fall in love too.
Similarly, while drinks delayed until after midday is a widely-held guideline for sip-happy Australians, in an airport’s hallowed halls, no such rules apply. Ordering a schooner of an overpriced IPA at 10 in the morning is reasonable, nay encouraged, when it comes to air travel, thus the folly of waiting for after-work drinks or an appropriate time for a dinner reservation ceases to exist.
Coffee dates often get a bad wrap for the extremely unromantic nature of the sun’s rays, but in an airport there is no daylight, there is no night, there are only twilight hours which stretch on forever, which means it’s always the perfect time for a nightcap. You could meet someone in the corner of a well-lit bar at 8:45am, and the only time constraint is making it on the plane.
Airports are a dating Neverland, where every man with a duffle bag is a lost boy, and every girl waiting for her $13 gin and tonic is Wendy, ready to be carried away.
Romantic daydreams aside, airport terminals are also really boring places to spend your time, unless you’ve lucked out and have landed a layover at Changi (in which there are four terminals, a 24-hour cinema and a butterfly reserve).
Being able to travel by air is an absolute privilege, but arriving in an international terminal three hours early means boredom is unavoidable, and at this time of year, delays in the domestic terminal aren’t just likely but inevitable.
So with thousands of people all confined to one space, with dulled enthusiasm and empty minds, there's no reason not to spend your time reading into every moment someone else's sphere intersects with your own, however ephemeral or inconsequentially.
Browsing for a bestseller in WH Smith can shift from a plight for survival on a long-haul flight to a meet-cute resembling that in a made-for-streaming rom-com.
Asking to use the communal laptop chargers when the other person is done, or sitting next to each other on the shared benches overlooking the tarmac needn’t feel like the cramped working spaces in the library at your old university, it could be the moment your life changes forever. Or at least just for an hour or two.
Whether you snag a date before your flight or even talk to another soul actually has no bearing on the success of an airport crush. The beauty is in your imagination.
In the airport, your romantic endeavours have endless possibilities, and so do you. And much like an office crush, the best part of an airport romance is that most of the time, nothing actually happens.
Any flirtationship is ensconced in a halo of romance, and the promise of freedom on the other side. Thanks to the miniature world of shops, bars, cafes and food halls, you can play pretend at a life beyond the walls of the airport – and then choose whether or not you’ll take it with you when you board the flight, or leave it, and the object of your sudden and intense affection, all behind.
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Originally published as People are trying to snag dates in airports – here's why you should too
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