So I 'infiltrated' in 'First Dates': dinner in the morning, mojitos and doubts with my Teruel league

-How's your ideal guy? Do not cut yourself. You ask for what you want. Who knows, maybe you're lucky.

I felt that the lamp genie was talking to me from the other side of the phone. The phrase "ask for what you want" rumbled in my head.

-Moreno, tall, with a beard, tan, hyperactive, adventurous, traveler, ambitious, concerned about the environment, open minded ...

Come on, the perfect boy. The chances that this man existed were virtually nil, but for once I took a face and got carried away, because ... what if ... yes? A week later I received a call:

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- We found him. !! Congratulations!! We wait for you in the studio where we recorded First Dates.

And the day arrived. There I was. Freshly made up, combed and with a microphone in the neckline that was going to record each of the words that came out of my mouth. The contract was already signed. Image rights no longer belonged to me. The proof was in my wallet in the form of bills. Specifically, he had 90 euros saved.

I pushed the gate and went into a room that seemed taken from the imaginary world of George Orwell. Countless video cameras pointed at me. Each and every one of my movements were recorded.

My eyes were fixed on him, or rather on his back. My date was in front of the bar, savoring a mojito. High, white shirt and blue pants. I later learned that it was Carlos, 29, a native of Teruel. A very traditional young man, calm, homemade, bullfighting to the core and too eager to get married. I took a breath, took out my chest and smiled. And that's how an EL SPANISH reporter infiltrated First Dates to see how a reality works that last 2018 billed more than 26 million euros and, perhaps, leave the program well accompanied.

Morning evening

The first step to go out on First Dates is to fill out an infinite form on the web in which you are asked all kinds of questions. From "Tell us something about yourself that nobody knows" to "Define your look", which can be from androgynous to cani. Then, attach a video and five photos of you. Two days after filling out the form, a First Dates casting editor calls me to convince me to go on the show.

-And what about my reputation?

-Quiet, people forget who you are. The important thing: don't say anything you don't want to say.

When you give absolutely all your personal information to the First Dates team, you imagine that you will have many things in common with your appointment. During my man's search, the editor gave me a half-hour interview by phone.

He insisted a lot on knowing more about my interest in traveling, whether I liked Latinos or not, my choice to be vegetarian and my opinion about bullfighting. When, days later, he called me telling me that they had found my better half, I assumed that he would meet some of these requirements.

That Tuesday was cited in Atocha at 9 in the morning. What I thought was going to be a romantic evening was actually a breakfast. Indeed, much of the First Dates appointments occur in the morning.

Diazepam for the nerves

Three other girls had been called at 9 at the Atocha station. They all agreed that they had not had a good love experience and that they were going to First Dates to find their better half. None had struck.

Jessi, a thirty-year-old from Valencia, had just taken a diazepam because her nerves were full of skin. This Valencian was a cashier in a supermarket and a lover of car rallies. “I am afraid that the boy will hurt me later,” added the Valencian in a conversation during the trip to the Warner Bros studios, where the program is recorded and which is located in the Madrid municipality of San Sebastián de los Reyes. He also confessed that one of the requirements that he had to meet his appointment was to be paid for dinner.

Paula, a native of the Dominican Republic, was convinced that her date was going to be a young black man with a son and María José, Madrid, in her 40s, had decided to come to the program in secret. "I am evangelical and I intend to find in First Dates a man who wants to get a virgin to marriage," the woman confessed.

It was set foot in the reality show studios and everything was in a hurry. “Lucia, you are one of the first. You go out in an hour, ”a worker in the production area told me and explained that every day more than 10 couples come to dinner. Some people think twice and decide not to appear.

We had a room reserved for us. There we changed, signed the contracts and put on makeup. We could not move freely through the building because our appointments were in other rooms.

“Here you have your 90 euros for going out in the program. The dinner is 15 euros and you will have to pay it with your money, but then it will be returned to you, ”explained one of the workers. "But if you want to invite your partner you will really do it," he added.

The choice of costumes was not entirely ours. The days before the appointment they asked us to wear two sets of clothes and then they would tell us what would be the ideal to go on screen. The religious Maria José was embedded in a dress with leopard print when suddenly the zipper broke. Luckily, the Madrid had another set. “I don't look good. Now I am much more nervous, ”he said.

15 minutes before my appointment a young man arrived in glasses and introduced himself saying he was my screenwriter. His mission was to remind me of the points he considered strongest in my personality. “Try not to make the date boring. Tell funny things and remember that you are vegetarian, hyperactive, that you do not like bulls very much, adventurous and very open, okay? ”Said the young man while reviewing the script he had prepared.

Before meeting my date, my screenwriter, like those of my classmates, had a premeditated idea of ​​how the appointment was going to take place due to the personality of the contestants. Once the meeting was over, those responsible for the post-production of the program would edit the videos following a preguion so that the episode broadcast was even more entertaining.

Dam in the jail of Panama

Around 12 in the morning I entered the set of First Dates. After the presenter Carlos Sobera welcomed me to the restaurant I met who was supposed to be my better half.

We were both very nervous and all we did was ask basic questions and drink mojitos at full speed. I did the same with the four glasses of wine that I ordered during the “dinner”.

On the next table was Paula, the young woman from the Dominican Republic. I was probably a little disappointed because there was no black man sitting in front of her. As the date went by I realized that we had few things in common and I began to feel like the Dominican.

Carlos - or as I ended up nicknamed him, Charlie - and I talked about sex, porn, marriage, bullfighting and a host of other topics. I soon understood that my screenwriter's intentions were to create some conflict. In order not to get out of the supposed script, I began to ask somewhat strange questions:

-Would you be a vegan for me once a week, Carlos?

-Without any problem.

I talked with my date about sex, porn, marriage, bullfighting ...

I talked to my date about sex, porn, marriage, bullfighting ... E.E.

When the Aragonese said he “wanted to find someone now” and that he wouldn't mind marrying me, I understood that he and the conflict didn't get along very well. I was polite, friendly and very sweet, but I kept trying to make the date fun by creating a somewhat unbalanced character of myself:

-What is the most risky thing you have done in your life?

-When I was little and I went to a girlfriend's house and I had to run because her parents were coming. Beyond that for now I have done nothing. And you?

- I was in the jail of Panama four months by drug traffic.

The dinner had to last an hour at the most, and the twin waitresses were in charge of telling us that we had to pay. Charlie insisted on inviting me, but I refused.

After finishing dinner, my appointment and I had to run to a room where our screenwriter asked us 30 questions about the course of dinner individually and that we had to answer by looking at the camera.

The important requirement was to rephrase the question so that it seemed that it was responding naturally. I knew my screenwriter's intentions, so I gave him the answers he wanted:

-If they told you that Carlos is a virgin, would you believe it?

-I thought it was a bit demure. If they tell me she's a virgin, I believe it.

The final decision

The date was coming to an end. I was sitting five centimeters from him and my nerves felt in the room. We both had to decide if we wanted to have a second date or not. The screenwriter knew 100% of our response and he decided who would answer first.

-Carlos, would you like to have a second date with Lucia?

-I would like to have a second date with Lucia. It is a girl that adapts to my tastes.

I had felt some affinity with the screenwriter and felt quite betrayed. I still had a minute to decide, and I thought about giving him the answer he didn't imagine in order to avoid poor swallowing of poor Charlie.

-And you, Lucia, a second date with Carlos?

-Is that I have not seen feeling of first ... so I think not.

In the end I decided to be honest and leave the show aside. I could hardly even look him in the eye. I tried to be delicate with my answer, but my refusal was quite evident. We kissed each other in front of the camera and went out the door, almost without saying goodbye. We had liked each other, but the reality show had left us a bitter taste. In the end, we had both become two First Dates puppets.