It has been a few weeks since the last letter.
We've spent many evenings at the desk in this stretch — two laptops, a few cups of tea gone cold, the slow warming of spring outside the window. That has been the picture of our work lately.
In the first letter, we wrote that we hoped every small, fragmented piece of life could find a gentle place to rest. This time, we want to come a little closer — and put that gentleness, specifically, into three things.
About a mother tongue
In our first year in the Netherlands, the most exhausting thing wasn't the cold winter, or the unpronounceable street names. It was the bills in our inbox we couldn't read.
CJIB. Belastingdienst. Vattenfall. At the beginning, those were just strings of letters to us. Open the email — guess once, look it up once, then ask a friend, anxiously: "Did I miss this one again?"
Over time we realized: the weight of those bills had nothing to do with the amount. It came from the not-understanding itself. It made us doubt ourselves.
So in this version, we did something laborious: we translated all of Bilingo, six times.
English. Dutch. Chinese. German. French. Spanish. Every screen, every button, every sentence the AI writes back to you. Open Profile → Preferences → Language, and pick the one that lets your shoulders drop a little.
We wanted Bilingo to learn how to speak with you in the way you find most familiar.
About the larger moments
The big moments in life never arrive one at a time.
When you move, the list of things to do suddenly becomes long — end the lease, change the address, transfer the internet, cancel the old, register the new. When you buy a home, it's an unending stream of contracts and signatures. Changing jobs, having a child, retiring — each of these feels like standing at an unfamiliar crossroads, with details pressing in on you all at once.
Slowly, we came to understand: what makes those moments feel overwhelming isn't the volume of tasks. It's not knowing what's still left undone.
So this time, we put real effort into building a Life Events list.
Moving, buying a home, getting married, having a child, leaving a job, starting a company, retiring — for each of these, what to take care of, and what tends to slip through the cracks, are written down. It isn't a tutorial. It's more like an old friend who, when you're standing at the crossroads unsure of what to do, reaches out a hand and says: "Don't forget these. Take your time."
About seeing
Through making this product, we've slowly come to believe one thing: a good tool is a mirror, not a teacher.
It shouldn't tell you what to do. But it should let you see clearly what you are doing.
In this version, we've upgraded the AI analysis. Quietly, it reads through your bills from the past few months, and then tells you: which expense has been creeping up, which subscriptions you may no longer be using, which large bills are coming next month.
It draws no conclusions. It only spreads out, in front of you, the numbers you may have stopped noticing.
We often think we have a sense of our own spending. But when the numbers actually appear in front of us, we realize, oh — the electricity bill has been rising for three months now. Oh — that service we stopped using last year is still being charged.
The AI doesn't make your decisions for you. It just helps you see yourself again.
About May
Next month, two small things will arrive that should make signing in and adding bills easier:
- One-tap sign-in with Google and Apple — so you no longer have to remember which email you used to register.
- Gmail and Outlook inbox scanning — once you grant permission, Bilingo will read and organize the bills in your inbox itself. You only need to confirm.
What we're really trying to do has never changed: to take a little of the worry off your shoulders.
About you
Thank you for being here.
We know your time is precious. Every time you open Bilingo is, to us, a small encouragement to keep going.
If anything feels off — a button placed wrong, a translation that sounds too stiff, a feature you've been hoping for that hasn't arrived yet — please write to us through the feedback in Profile. We read every single one.
May this spring find you light.