First Dates recap: Ambitious Aamiya intimidates and impresses Dave from Athlone
First Dates Ireland
First through The Gibson's doors tonight is Renata, who is looking for "a simple guy that can handle me".
The bubbly Lithuanian native is looking for someone who loves animals, is kind, is strong, is active... "the list just goes on," she says with a good natured laugh.
She's paired with 34-year-old John from Mayo who reckons he can impress just by walking through the doors - cue him pointing to his 'guns'.
The first question of the night (after "what is your name," of course) is "what do you do?" and 37-year-old Renata surprises when she responds that not only does she work as a quality technician for a medical devices company, she's also a "part-time soldier".
Yes, this very lovely lady is an artillery gunner in the Irish Army Reserves.
"That's crazy," John says. What's more crazy to us, is that Renata forgets John's name on the date - is anyone keeping a record of how many times this has happened this season?
"You'll have to invest in a necklace," Renata jokes - she's wearing one with her name, so luckily John won't make a similar error.
The pair have lots of laughs during their date, as well as touching on some fairly serious topics like Renata losing her father at the young age of 13, and John's near-death experience in a family car crash, also aged 13, over dinner.
At the end of the night, there are two yesses and a kiss on the cheek.
Dylan from Limerick likes texting the likes of Katy Perry and Rihanna when he's drunk - but he's never had a response.
So, now the 25-year-old marketing executive is in Dublin for the day to see if he can find someone who isn't afraid to "belt some Celine Dion" or bust a move on the dance floor.
He's paired with Tommy, 27, from Wexford who admits he is often found on the dancefloor, or doing karaoke at The George.
Tommy is looking for someone he can bring to Croke Park and Coppers, and arrives wearing a 'send nudes' necklace, which he says is his "catchphrase".
Over the course of the date, the pair discuss their experiences coming out, rugby, and Eurovision, and share desserts too.
After the date, Dylan says Tommy ticks "a lot of boxes" and is up for more dates... but Tommy says while he found his date to be a lovely guy, there was "nothing there" for him romantically.
"I feel so mean saying that... but there's no point wasting someone else's time". Hear, hear.
Dubliner Aamiya hasn't been lucky in love - and her mam says it's because she's "too picky".
"I have high standards," she admits. But it's because she's realised loneliness can be better than being with the wrong person.
"I haven't figured out what's wrong with me," she tells barman Neil when he asks about her dating history. "Maybe [my date] will be able to tell me..."
Asked what she's looking for, she says good looks come first.
"Because if they don't appeal to my eyes, they won't appeal to my heart." Fair enough.
"Ambition is important," she adds, "I have two degrees, I am going for my third..."
No wonder Dave, 29, from Athlone, feels a bit intimidated.
Pre-date, he tells us he's afraid of "babbling on," and it seems like that's what he does when he first meets Aamiya, cheeks reddening. "You've saved me," he says when Alice arrives to bring them to their table. Bless.
Over dinner, the pair discuss coding, side hustles and the book Dave wrote during the pandemic, which was on a laptop that was stolen three weeks prior to the date. He's rewriting it from scratch.
Bar that tragically sad story, the pair have a fun date full of laughter and eye contact.
At the end of the night - it's a yes from both to date number two.
"He's husband material," Aamiya says.
Carpenter James is "shitting a brick" ahead of his date. The 21-year-old from Mayo almost loses his life when he sees 20-year-old Emma walk through the doors.
"Oh lord help me, lord help me" he says, clearly nervous.
"She's a bit too good looking for me," he says later, "but sure you should always be punching.."
Emma "gave up men for lent" before and admits "it was probably the best 40 days of my life". But, she's prepared to give them another go.
The Bray girl is a dancer and has done pretty much everything - tap, commercial, musical theatre, jazz, lyrical.. but she's never done Irish dancing. A pity, as James is a keen sean-nós dancer.
The conversation flows during the date, but Emma says she didn't feel a spark, so they end their rendezvous there and then (James would have said yes for the record).
