My VPN took me to Australia and dropped me into ‘Married at First Sight’

Editor’s note: This is the first of a four-part series about Married at First Sight, the international reality television show. The show originated in Denmark in 2013 and now has franchises in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia.

I never meant to become an armchair tourist. Yet here I am, a retired gringo in the Andes, travelling through cyberspace on a cheap desktop. One click of the VPN and I am in Melbourne. Another click and I am in Darwin. A third click and I am right there next to the Sydney Opera House watching Married at First Sight Australia, which is a televisual feast cooked over a dumpster fire.

If you have never seen it, imagine a wedding organised by a group of tradies whose day job is installing gutters. The men turn up with haircuts that look like they were done with sheep shears after a long, hot afternoon in a tin shed. Some arrive decorated with homemade tattoos, the sort done during long nights under a forty-watt bulb with a darning needle and set of colored biros.

The brides look like respectable adults. The grooms look like they got dressed during a power outage.

Australians claim to be laid back. I call it cheerful denial. Nothing says laid back like drinking heavily on national television while explaining that you are ready for lifelong commitment. I admire their courage. I also admire the camera crew, who keep steady hands while a groom carefully wipes his mouth after kissing a woman he met twelve minutes earlier.

This is the joy of VPN travel. You can sit quietly in your apartment in Ecuador while an entire continent conducts marital experiments for your entertainment. No airports. No luggage. No jet lag. Just the pleasure of watching grown men and women realise that marriage is harder than it looks in bridal equipment brochures.

People travel to broaden the mind. I travel to observe the Australian bridegroom under stress. He is at his most expressive when he recognises, all too late, that he has made a serious scheduling error.

My VPN will take me anywhere, but Australia keeps pulling me back. At least the landscapes are beautiful.

To be continued…