‘He has a good-looking hairdresser, and I’ve learned a new skill’

While many people found the curfew traumatic, Ilse Bot (20) has lots of good memories from that time. As a first-year student in the first year of the pandemic, she fell in love online with one of her fellow students, Gertjan Soet. “Before our first date, I didn’t really know what the rest of him looked like. But I knew I liked the part I could see on video calls.”

“It all started with a four-hour zoom call. We spent five minutes talking about the assignment and several hours talking about everything else. Whether it’s okay to drink milk with dinner. If you eat sausage on bread, is it still sausage, or is it really salami? This was in the third block of our first year of the International Bachelor’s in Economics & Business Economics. That year, nearly everything was online. We were randomly divided into groups of two or three for Academic Skills. We were put together, and that’s how it started. We’ve now had loads of conversations like that one.”

“I told him I couldn’t stand my little brothers’ hairstyles. After my family had bought a hair trimmer, my mom said I would under no circumstances be allowed to cut my brothers’ hair. Gertjan said I could practise on his hair, though, so I cut his hair on our first date. I spent three hours on it. A bit on this side, a bit on that side, oh now it’s not symmetrical. Let’s just say I’m a lot better at it now. I still cut his hair. He saves money and has a good-looking hairdresser, and I’ve learned a new skill.”

“Back then, the curfew had just started. So we had to say goodbye on time, because travelling took about an hour. Still, I didn’t really think about the curfew much. I mainly thought: great! I get to visit him again. It was actually a really lovely time. Since everything was closed, I met his parents on our second date. And all because we were paired up for an assignment. It’s crazy, right?”

“We have the same outlook on life. I think that’s why we clicked straight away. We are both IBEB and Law students, we both still live at home – he lives in Bodegraven and I live in Leiden – and we both work at different Albert Heijn supermarkets – I am a checkout operator, and he works in the produce department. Moreover, we’re both teaching assistants and we’re both very social. It just immediately felt right.”