Reflecting over the past year over curly fries and Diet Coke with my friend Shirley, I came to the conclusion that this year might possibly have been a pile of social waste.
Living away from home, in a new city, with new people, you'd think I would've gotten blind drunk every night and pimped myself out to every man, woman and dog on the street. But apparently not. Friend count for the year: 3.562-ish. I didn't realise I was quite that tragic. All this time I'd been under the impression that I'd made a lot of friends this year. I'm not exactly socially inept, I talk to everyone, I'm generally a nice person. I assumed that was enough.
But Shirley did have a point. I'd spent every weekend running back and forth between cities to go visit the Boyfriend. When I wasn't visiting the Boyfriend, I was engrossed in keeping up with my 5 Law papers. When I wasn't doing those things, I'd be doing lunch/coffee/intense gossip-cum-bitching sessions with Shirley and Nina (2 out of the 3.562 new friends I'd made). Moral of the story: out of sight, out of mind.
Moreover, she brought up the very valid point that 'to integrate with Kiwis is to drink with Kiwis'. We came to the fobbish conclusion that it was a 'New Zealand thing'. But it's true. Friendships here are made of drunken memories that are an oxymoron in themselves. Especially in Hoboville (where I currently live). Leaving the sophisticated folk back home in Auckland, I wasn't aware how immersed in middle New Zealand I would be this year.
So my goal for summer? Drink more.
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