Greek woman creates app for finding people to engage in activities with

Bowling has been a favorite activity for Christos since he was a child. However, in his adult life, he has not found people who share the same love. In fact, to the repeated calls to his friends to go "for a game", the answer is always "no". At the same time, Sofia, who recently moved to a house very close to the New Beach of Thessaloniki, considers it a shame not to take advantage of the fact and go for a run every day on the regenerated beachfront. Something that, however, she does not want to do alone, while she does not have anyone in her environment who has the same desire.

An app is coming to meet the needs of people like Sofia and Christos, so that they no longer have to miss out on things they like because their loved ones don't have the same interests or have difficulty getting along. There, users select the category they are interested in and arrange live games and activities with other available users.

How the app works
"By downloading the app and creating an account in a very simple way (using an email and password), you have two options: Either participate in an activity that already exists and another user is looking for people, or create a new one, stating the area, the day and hours that suit you and how many "teammates" you are looking for," Dimitra Sakellariou, the person behind the app, tells the Athenian/Macedonian News Agency. “Below the basic information about the event, there is a space where you can write comments, such as if you are a beginner or if you want to play at a high level, even if you prefer to play only with people of the same sex,” she adds.

The Hobbito application
From basketball, football, volleyball, tennis and table tennis, to billiards, paintball, chess, hiking and cycling, but even more specific activities, such as dog walking or karaoke, are some of those that users can choose from, who are constantly communicating with the administrators to request that others, their own favorites, be added. Already, according to Ms. Sakellariou, a category with board games is going to be added in the coming days.

The 34-year-old creator clarifies that she has nothing to do with IT, on the contrary she is a psychologist, while she had the idea for the creation of this specific application during the period of restrictive measures due to the coronavirus pandemic. "The idea came to me during the lockdown period. Too many people at that time felt lonely, had isolated themselves, could not find their friends and had fallen into sadness. I thought that within this limited time that they were giving for a walk, it would help them to come together with other people with common interests, to do their activities together, but also to change appearances, to talk to another person," explains Ms. Sakellariou. Of course, the original idea can still be easily applied today and aims to bring together people who have the same interests.