Harlo

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Inspiration

There are lots of resources out there to help facilitate the process of migration, covering the different administrative processes and services. However, one thing that often goes neglected is the social aspect of it. Feelings of homesickness and loneliness are common in those who moved overseas, leaving their friends, family, and local community behind. Our app, Harlo, aims to connect these Singaporeans and help them form a community overseas.

What it does

The 2 main features of Harlo are its chat room function and its event space. With the chat room function, users can strike a conversation with other nearby users and filter based on profession, age, and hobby to find like-minded individuals. The events function will allow users to set up meetups to form a more meaningful connection face-to-face and even celebrate festivals like Singapore's National Day!

How we built it

We started with some research online about the pain points of migrating overseas. Afterwards, we deciding to zoom into the social aspect of it and conducted some interviews with our friends residing overseas. Based on their feedback and insights, we built our lo-fi prototype and conducted some usability testing before finally arriving at our final product.

What we learned

It has been a fun journey doing this hackathon and trying to think of ways to value-add to the lives of Singaporeans all over the globe. Through this experience, we understood the importance of putting users first and identifying the pain points before moving forward. All too often, we jump the gun and come up with a solution without thinking if there's a need for it first. This hackathon serves as a reminder to always find the root of a problem before starting to tackle it.

What's next for Harlo

Our next step is to try and build this app on React Native. We think one way to improve this app if it is actualized is to partner with restaurants and pubs to host regular meetups.