So I’ll preface this by saying it’s a travel story, and as many of us know traveling is basically easy mode for picking up. But I believe the lessons are useful in all contexts.

So this I arrived in a new town at a new hostel. A “party hostel” of course. Party hostels are always the move, they just attract people that want to socialise - and girls that want to hook up.

I’m a pretty introverted guy usually, but today I was just feeling it. Wanted to talk to everyone.

There were 3 other guys in my 6 bed dorm, and when I was moving in I started chatting to them and made fast friends. Two were from the states: one quite chatty one less so. And one was from Scandinavia somewhere: a 19yo tall pretty boy. Usually my instinct would be to be wary of hanging around dudes that are possibly competition, but tonight I was just friendly.

We quickly planned to go on the pubcrawl the hostel was running that night, and I kinda set myself up to be a bit of the life of the party (not my usual role). In walked in a blonde girl - maybe a 6-7, and I remember the first thing I said to her was

“so what are we thinking, pub crawl tonight”? And I’d never met her, but suddenly she’s on board and introducing herself to the guys in the room.

Now an important thing to note for all those people that struggle socially like me… no one else has any clue what’s going either. And if I can give one tip for getting fast friends while traveling, it’s this: just pretend you’re already friends. Especially in a group setting.

Because what happened with this girl, I found out later, was she thought I was traveling with these guys, and these guys all thought I knew her because of how casually I started talking to her.

So suddenly, I’m the guy that knows everyone.

Fast forward and we’re all on the pubcrawl and I notice who is say was the hottest girl in the room, probably an 8.5-9, super cute and really fit body. I know we’re in the same group for the whole night so don’t approach yet, just hang out with the guys from my room, chat to some new people too.

But good news, blonde girl from my room is friends with hot girl. Perfect.

And later on, I’m getting a drink from the bar and blonde girl opens me and I lay the charm on. She’s not who I want but she’s my in. We move back to her friends. Me talking to three girls, and I’m still feeling good and I’m literally dropping the best chat of my entire life. And they’re all eating it up. And, merciful god, hot girl ends up knocking my drink out of my hand.

I couldn’t have planned it better. I flirt and tell her she needs to buy me another drink and we go up yo the bar together. A lot of flirting, and then she asks me how old I am.

This is a brilliant question, because this is something women ask when they’re trying to qualify you. They do it when they’re interested. Even better is to beat them to it, but I chicken out of that because this girl looked young.

I said I was 27, she goes “oh my god” and looks embarrassed. Awesome. Why’s it awesome? Because she’s already noticing the age gap in a sexual context, meaning she’s thinking of me in a sexual context already.

I ask her how old she is she makes me guess ofc. I aim a bit higher than I thought and go 21.

She says 19, again looking shy and embarrassed. I roll with her implied frame of wow theres a bit of an age gap if we were to fuck tonight by saying something like “oh wow yeah you’re quite young”.

Fast forward to later in the night, we made out at the second bar and were at a club. She’s being a bit washy and I fully expected to lose her, but then she goes: “where’s your tall blonde Scandinavian friend? Blonde girl is into him”.

Perfect. She wants to set up her friend, this means they’ve discussed both hooking up with us tonight. Girls are far more comfortable hiking up in twos.

So I go find my boy, and get him paired off with blonde girl - he thinks I’m a god at this point.

Long story short, no one slept well in that dorm that night. Would’ve gone for the 4some but there were others in there, and hot girl told me while we were getting to it that this would be her second time ever. Not second person, second time. Wish I had a hotel room.

So yeah, this story highlights how important forming quick friends and connections is to a successful night, how to recognise interest signs from a girl, and how to utilise a guy who could be competition to your advantage.

Cheers all.