On the Road

Making connections in your new home will be about the most important and possibly the most challenging aspect of moving abroad. Differences of culture, language and just starting from scratch in a new place can lead to some lonely times in the beginning. Finding your social circle can take months and months and it’s important that you don’t give up too easily.

One way to make life easier on yourself is if you emigrate with a partner, then you’ve always got someone to compare notes with at the end of the day. And someone’s shoulder to cry on when you blow up your Ipod because the electric runs on a different voltage.

If you arrive alone, you need a good deal of self-sufficiency and social skills so that you don’t get swallowed up by loneliness. Then again, people will be more likely to approach you when you’re alone so keep that smile up.

Whatever your feelings are about them, a cell phone will make life much easier. That way when you meet someone at the beach or in a bar they can always get in touch to invite you to the next jam session, party or orgy. Your cell phone can become your lifeline, especially if you live in a city where people just don’t stop and talk on the street that much.

So how do you meet people and make friends?

Ideally, it will happen naturally. You’ll enroll in a yoga class and get talking to the hot local stretching next to you, who invites you to a soiree of the coolest minds and bodies around…

Reality may be more like: you head out each night to a bar, hoping to make friends and end up looking like the loneliest person there, slumped on the bar, desperately trying to look like you’re having a good time.

Some people have the knack of meeting people effortlessly – we suspect they’re probably the beautiful women amongst us – but for most people it takes time. In a small place, people tend to get to know each other pretty quickly, so you have only to see the same person a few times in the same places to end up saying hi and talking about the weather. In big cities though there are many, many more people to meet and it gets paradoxically harder to make friends with any of them.

The main thing is to get out there. If you do a lot of shopping in the markets, find yourself a job somewhere, enroll in classes of some kind and hang out at the same cafes and nightspots, eventually social contacts will evolve naturally. It may take time before you find real friends but at least you’ll have someone to talk to in the meantime.

One quick fix is to contact anyone from the hospitalityclub in your area and see if they’re in the mood to hang out and introduce you to their friends. One or two good introductions can be all you need to open up entire scenes for you.

Even if you’re not planning to work you might as well give a few private lessons of your native language and afterwards you can hang out with your students who may be very happy to show their teacher around.

Most people assume that hitting the bars will be the ideal social mixing ground. The thing is that whilst alcohol has indeed been ‘getting ugly people laid for generations’, the cheery introductions you made after 12 beers tend to fade into hungover wisps of memory by the next day. You’ll call up a number that someone thoughtlessly gave you at 3 in the morning and it’s even money if they’ll remember who you are, much less your name. Friendships made whilst sober are more likely to last.

Failing all else, if you live close to a beach you can always pull the line of leaving your bag with someone sexy while you go for a swim – then when you return you’ve already broken the ice and can ask them if they come there often…

Want to meet other road junkies?
Come to the Road Junky Sahara Retreat Feb 6-11 2012 to hang out with 30 other travelers to meditate, make yoga, tell stories and dance under the full moon in the desert.

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