Red Oak Lane lovers: Where are they now?
Rutgers’ own Cinderella story
On October 11th, a post different from all the ones attempting to buy and sell textbooks and football game tickets showed up on the Rutgers Class of 2019 Facebook group.
It was a post from a lovelorn student, Jon Steven, calling on his peers for help to find a certain mystery girl.
The post went viral pretty quickly, garnering 957 likes and 89 comments and producing the hashtag #FindRedOakLaneGirl2k15. It also started a trend of people hitting up their crushes with the pick up line, “Will you be my Red Oak Lane Girl?” and posting the results in the comments section.
Others made jokes that if the two found each other, they should walk around Passion Puddle three times and get married.
The day after Jon posted, the friend of Red Oak Lane girl commented on the post revealing her and her friend’s identity by tagging her. It was a new twist in this Rutgers fairytale.
For those following the post on Facebook, this was where the story would leave the public eye. But now, a month and a half later, we want to know: “Where are they now?”
The Tab spoke with the so-called “Red Oak Lane Lovers,” freshman Jon Chuang (Jon Steven), an Exercise Science major, and freshman Sara Ali, a Public Policy major, on what happened after that fateful Facebook post.
Sara said: “When I first saw Jon, he was dressed nicely and he looked friendly so I asked him for directions.”
Red Oak Lane
Clearly Jon was lovestruck, so why would he wait two days between seeing Sara and posting in the Facebook group?
Jon said: “I was debating whether it was a joke or they were only messing with me, or if it was real life. My curiosity got me to post it later on.”
A photo of Jon
On finding out about the post, Sara said: “I was shocked to see it. I started yelling and my roommate and I started dancing and put it on Snapchat. We were excited to see so many likes.”
“I actually didn’t notice her roommate’s comment on my post until the next day,” Jon said. “My friend texted me letting me know Red Oak Lane Girl was found. I guess my reaction was like, ‘damn, this actually worked.'”
A photo of Sara taken by Jon
The two decided to meet up. Jon said they hung out a few times, but where did their love story go from there?
“Sorry to disappoint, but it didn’t work out,” Jon said.
“There was a lot of pressure on social media but neither of us were looking for a relationship, so we decided we should just be friends,” Sara added.
Jon said: “It was a mutual agreement.”
Cue the tears. But all is still well with the two, and the whole experience has been pretty unique.
“It’s crazy when random people recognize me from the Facebook post,” Sara said. “But Jon is a good friend, and I’m glad I met him.”