Friends- hard to find?
-
Hi, for those of you who ventured overseas alone, was it difficult to make new friends? The uni i intend to go to has 50% aussies. =x
-
i dunno........if i go to sg one day i wonder if i can make friends....
-
Originally posted by Jfund:
Hi, for those of you who ventured overseas alone, was it difficult to make new friends? The uni i intend to go to has 50% aussies. =x
it's not hard at all.. just have to be open. i don't have any friends from asia, can't seem to find em and not really bothered about it. my friends are all canadians or from the US.
-
I studied in melb uni but when i was there, i seldomly saw any racial mixing. Even if there was, it was mostly the Australian born asians who were befriending the ang mohs.
-
its not...at first i thought it was...just go there with an open mind...and you'll be fine =)
-
You shouldn't have any problems making new friends overseas as long as you keep an open mind and maintain a willingness to mingle with people from other cultures.
About the worst thing you could do is spend almost all of your free time among your fellow countrymen. I saw this happen with other Singaporean students during my undergrad and grad years, and could find no sympathy for them when they complained of not being able to make friends outside of their own clique of Singaporean and Malaysian colleagues.
-
Originally posted by Meia Gisborn:
You shouldn't have any problems making new friends overseas as long as you keep an open mind and maintain a willingness to mingle with people from other cultures.
About the worst thing you could do is spend almost all of your free time among your fellow countrymen. I saw this happen with other Singaporean students during my undergrad and grad years, and could find no sympathy for them when they complained of not being able to make friends outside of their own clique of Singaporean and Malaysian colleagues.
i know ! and the best part is, during summer break they all head back to Singapore for a holiday. then have the cheek to complain that aus or canada is boring.. nothing to do. so going back to sg is a better option.
i wonder how 2 countries, way bigger then sg can be boring. i haven't been back to sg in 2 years, nothing missing one bit of it at all ! i got alot of better things to do here.
-
umm...i'm the only non-white in many of my classes >.<
join clubs. join societies.
in most oz unis, there's a sg/malaysian society or something. there's nothing wrong with joining that.
neither is there anything wrong with looking for other singaporeans while ur there.
not sure abt your school, but go for orientation!
in my school. if you take biz courses, you're bound to find friends or at least acquaintances because there's A LOT of group projects.
-
i don't have problems making friends when i was a students in the US. infact that is the best time to make friends......less agenda....u just. So keep an open mind.
-
Originally posted by Jfund:
Hi, for those of you who ventured overseas alone, was it difficult to make new friends? The uni i intend to go to has 50% aussies. =x
what's the point of going overseas for your studies, if you're just gonna cluster fark with fellow singaporeans ? ....
-
Originally posted by Meia Gisborn:
keep an open mind and maintain a willingness to mingle with people from other cultures.
that's the key; mingle.
it would be so boring to go overseas and continue to clique with your SEA counterparts. i guess one should have fellow singaporeans in their frens list but to just stick to your comfort zone would have been wrong.
regardless of study or live, we should make it an effort to get to know others from another culture; whites, blacks and in between.
it would have been too easy to stick to your own flock, but it would have been a disservice to yourself.
-
yeah its kind of waste of money spend all the money to live in a foreign country and spend half of the time try find familiarity.
-
In the beginning, you'll make a lot of aquaintances first, because real friendship takes time to build. But over time, when you have gained each other's trust, you can find yourself with new friends.
If you're alone in a foreign land, things are always tougher in the first year or so and different people will have different adjustment rates and adaptability. Plus, all of us face different circumstances and challenges which will determine how well and how quickly we settle in.
Now, I have Malaysian/Singaporean friends but I've also made friends with quite a few Aussies and people of other nationalities like South Africans, Polish, Romanians, Indians, British, etc. It's a really interesting mix.
The key is open mind and no expectations. You'll find a lot of differences with those who come from different places but try to focus on the similarities and not accentuate the differences.
The longer you remain overseas, you'll realise that the more you'll lose friends who are back home anyways. "Out of sight, out of mind". Migrants will always tell you that they think fondly of their friends back home but their friends quickly move on and forget them all too quickly. All migrants I've spoken to talk of this stage they go through where they are 'neither here nor there' - going home is no longer the same because things change, and yet you aren't exactly firmly rooted in your new home yet. It's the uncomfortable stage where one finds oneself 'in limbo'.
-
I believe you have to make ur first move to make new friends.
I was in Australia for my final year and managed to know some local friends. Plus, my project team members were all aussies.
Btw, are you currently in Australia? if so, which part of it? :)
-
it's not as difficult or as scary as you think. and you don't really need to have a large group of friends, acquaintances maybe. start with a small group in your dorm or class, build up from there.
-
be otaku.