Built by an international student,
for international students.

Hi — I'm Rian Fernando. I'm a Sri Lankan international student at Adelphi University in New York, and I built Yaluwo for students like me.

When I arrived in the United States, I expected the hardest part to be the coursework. It wasn't. The hardest part was how quiet a new country gets when you don't know anyone who understands where you come from. The food, the language, the small inside jokes — all of it disappears overnight.

I kept meeting other international students who felt the same way. There were Sri Lankans and Nigerians and Indians and Brazilians on campuses all over the country — people from back home, close by — and we had no way to actually find each other. Instagram and Facebook weren't built for this. They're built for strangers performing for strangers.

So I made Yaluwo. In Sinhala, it means “friends.”It's a verified, student-only network where your home country is your community and connection requests feel like an introduction — not a follow.

My hope is that Yaluwo gives the next international student a head start I didn't have: a person from home, within reach, from day one.