hello, in many languages
a language exchange in chicago — one room, a name tag with the language you're learning, and ~80 strangers finding out how much they can already say.
i want to help people connect — and i believe language is the best way to do it.
150+
through the door
~80
per night, average
350
on the email list
002
vols poured · 003 loading
the story, one untranslatable word at a time.
[01]
/yuán fèn/ · mandarin · noun
the quiet pull of fate that brings strangers into each other's lives — you don't find it, you meet it.
i want to help people connect, and i believe language is the best way to do it. you can't small-talk in a language you're learning — you reach for words, you laugh at the misses, you actually listen. i haven't found a faster way to turn strangers into friends.
[02]
/rén qíng wèi/ · mandarin · noun
literally 'the flavor of human feeling' — the warmth people leave behind in a room.
the format is almost nothing: a bar, a marker, a name tag with your name and the language you're learning. the room sorts itself — spanish in the corner booth, korean by the bar, mandarin over a mahjong table. no curriculum, no levels, no app — just enough structure that nobody gets stuck standing alone.
[03]
/jeong/ · korean · noun
the bond that grows between people who keep showing up for each other — deeper than affection, slower than love.
vol 1 filled a pub in may. vol 2 packed a bigger room a month later. ~80 people a night, 350 on the email list, and it grew on pure word of mouth — people bringing the friend they said they'd bring. the fastest-growing language exchange in chicago, on zero dollars of marketing.
[04]
/i·chi·go i·chi·e/ · japanese · phrase
'one time, one meeting' — this room, these people, tonight, will never assemble exactly this way again.
almost nobody in the room is fluent, and that's fine — trying out loud is the whole event, and next month is always on the calendar. vol 3 is pouring soon. the email list gets the date first.
everything it takes to run: a marker, name tags and a bar.
the room, on video — shot by the people in it.
two volumes in, shot on the same camera that covers everything i host — big groups having fun win.
next
vol 003 is pouring.
the email list gets the date first — 350 people already on it.
