Why the hell is it so hard to meet people...

[Epic Reine 0]

Me and my friends talk about this a lot.

 

Back in high school, it was so ridiculously easy to meet new people and make friends. The friends that I know and hang out with now and all people I met in high school. Back before I started my freshman year in college, I was excited to be in a different surrounding and meet new people. I'm in my third year now and haven't really made any friends since I was a freshman and I don't know why and my friends have experienced the same thing. Is it because high school was a smaller, more interactive setting? Did it have more people you could relate to? Maybe it's just me...

[Brett Favre 0]

Well, it's like my second week and college, and I already see the same thing. I have a few friends from high school around, so it's not so bad, but everyone seems serious and to themselves more during classes. No one speaks to each other, makes jokes like they use to. Being an adult seems boring.

[Guest Felonies!]

This thread is gonna get ugly in a hurry.

 

In before the dumbfuckery: I like some of the people I've been chatting with before/during/after classes the last two or three days, but I think I enjoy talking to my professors more.

[Special K 0]

Freshman year usually sort of sucks.

 

Everyone says you meet your realy friends sophomore year, and it's true. Freshman year most people generally just fall in with whomever they live around.

 

Going to a state or party school helps, unless you want to spend all day in serious academic discussions, or so I understand from the couple friends I had who went to small liberal arts colleges.

 

Also, I had the opposite experience, as I went to a very small, elite high school. Most everyone was way too full of their own shit, and all my friends were from a couple neighboring public schools, or grade school days.

 

 

Going to Tulane, there were plenty of opportunities for these kind of discussions, but the kind of people that gravitated there were more laid back. It was a revelation after high school. I don't hang out with a single kid from high school anymore, but I still talk to, and have visited, college buddies.

 

 

Where do y'all go?

[Murmuring Beast 0]

People are idiots in the first year, don't read anything into it.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

I kinda don't know how you could help but meet people in college. Not to get ugly, as Czech warned, but if you just take a look at the situation you're in you can meet people easily.

 

-The majority of people live in a dorm first year, have a roommate, and are in some setting (hall, suite-style, whatever) where they have a default of 10-30 people right there. No way you'll be friends with all of them but it's gotta be tough to not find a few people in there. Or even in your building.

-Colleges have shit-tons of clubs and organizations. Join one, instant friends. Be in a play, write for the newspaper, do something vaguely political, join a service organization, whatever.

-By taking classes you're interested in, you're guaranteed to run up against some people with common interests. Plenty will be dumb, but plenty will be cool.

-There are an infinite number of parties. If you can smoke, drink, be funny, dance, or tell good stories, you have friends.

 

Cena's Writer, don't hang out with high school friends all the time, or you'll find yourself sitting around having gay conversations that sounds like they're out of American Pie 2:

 

"Everything's changed, man. [beat] Everything's changed."

 

Seriously. My superlame roommate first year got into that mindset and it crippled him the whole time he was at school. Going to a school where I didn't know anyone at all was fantastic, and I love my old high school friends. Just be amiable and you'll meet plenty of people, because a whole lot of them are in the same exact situation as you.

[Edwin MacPhisto 0]

Going to Tulane

I know at least 7 people who went to Tulane for a year or two, then transferred. I know lots of people transfer at any school, but anecdotally I've run into a disproportionate number of, uh, Green Wavers. Great name, incidentally.

[Guest Felonies!]

Hey, that wasn't so bad. I was worried that some guy who values posters would start getting really obnoxious about the whole thing.

[Annabelle 0]

i didn't go to university to make friends. those who do usually aren't as successful. there are exceptions, of course. but if i was to talk to make friends with anyone, it would be to find a mate. not a drinking buddy.

[geniusMoment 0]

Just give it some time. Joke around with the people who sit next to you in some of your classes and see how they respond. Once you start talking with someone ask if they want to get lunch at one of the restaurants on campus or something. Just go from there. The biggest thing is making idle conversation with people who look like the type you will like.

[Guest Felonies!]

Or girls with the most cleavage showing.

[geniusMoment 0]

Or girls with the most cleavage showing.

That's a given.

[Hank Kingsley 0]

Remembering people's names might be a different story, but yeah, I haven't found it difficult at all to meet people in the 3 weeks I've been here. Clubs or teams can definitely do it. And parties.

[Guest Princess Leena]

College is about having friends. It's about having orgasms. If you really want to meet people, get a job. A respectable job, where you can meet rich people.

[Guest Felonies!]

Or girls with the most cleavage showing.

That's a given.

If she's dressed that well for an 8 a.m. class, she can't be doing the old "I'm taken so who do I need to impress" thing, right?

[tominator89 0]

You'll probably have better luck in your 2nd or 3rd semester. The first semester has all sorts of morons, who thankfully tend to be weeded out.

[Hawk 34 0]

One of the key reasons it's difficult to transition from HS into College in terms of friendship is simply because in HS, you grew up with those people and you knew who you fit with.

 

In college, it's a different scene. Even if you attend a school with former classmates, it's still a small minority.

 

Meeting people in college isn't that difficult, but the problem is simply deciding who is approchable. The best ways of getting to know people beyond the meaningless pre/post class conversations have been covered.

 

Parties, clubs(social or political), sports (every school has a wide assortment of rec sports) and of course, people who are taking the same special interest classes as you. It's perfectly fine to keep in touch with HS friends, especially since it should connect you with new people through those friends.

 

Don't get in the habit of keeping to those HS friends though, college is supposed to be more then just a place of academic growth.

[NoCalMike 0]

College is about having friends. It's about having orgasms. If you really want to meet people, get a job. A respectable job, where you can meet rich people.

 

 

Dear Princess Leena,

 

I am happy to report that you have been accepted into NoCalMike University. See you on registration day...!!

[NoCalMike 0]

In highschool you were mostly going to school with the same kids since Elementary school, and there was probably such a limited amount of things to do academically and socially, that most people fall into one big group or a bunch of smaller groups that just merge at parties/dances/kick-backs etc...

 

In College, everyone is probably into their own thing and you just have to actively seek out people with similar interests. Check bulletin boards, postings, listings etc...for clubs/groups/social gatherings that seem interesting, a lot of times you might meet the best people via friends of friends of friends etc....you never know.

[Special K 0]

I know at least 7 people who went to Tulane for a year or two, then transferred. I know lots of people transfer at any school, but anecdotally I've run into a disproportionate number of, uh, Green Wavers. Great name, incidentally

 

I was really sick of New Orleans after 3 years. By that time, I had some really good friends and was pretty deep in my studies, so it didn't really matter.

 

I can understand transferring out of Tulane after a year. I considered it. The freshman class seemed to be composed of people there JUST to party. After a year of that shit, they either flunked out or matured a little.

[Slayer 0]

College is about having friends. It's about having orgasms. If you really want to meet people, get a job. A respectable job, where you can meet rich people.

Dear Princess Leena,

 

I am happy to report that you have been accepted into NoCalMike University. See you on registration day...!!

Right now you're gnawing on your leg trying to escape from the trap

[Lt. Al Giardello 0]

I already have 2 girls cellphone numbers.

[Prophet of Mike Zagurski 0]

i didn't go to university to make friends. those who do usually aren't as successful. there are exceptions, of course. but if i was to talk to make friends with anyone, it would be to find a mate. not a drinking buddy.

 

Atually with friends/frats, you have an opportunity to make connections and network with people who could get you a job.

As for the friends thing. don't worry about it. Everyone is too afraid to act normal. It will go away after the first money.

 

I think it's harder to make friends if you commute to school.

[Bruiser Chong 0]

I went to a community college for three years, so most of the people I hung out with were friends from high school. But this was the time when I became better friends with them, whereas high school, we'd always been friends who didn't hang out much outside of school. I don't view that as a bad thing, since we seem to have matured since graduating (actually they're all a year older than me) and don't act like we're still in high school.

 

That's really what you need to watch out for when it comes to hanging out with people from high school. I know a group of people who hang out with everyone they were friends with in high school and act like they're still in high school.

 

I didn't make a lot of great friends those three years, but because I worked for the newspaper, I knew a ton of people around campus I could shoot the breeze with.

 

But from what I've seen on University campuses, there's really no way you can help but make friends if you're living on campus, especially your first year or two.

[randomguy 0]

Same thing always happens for freshman. They form large groups and do everything in herds of 10+. Everyone seems to have a ton of friends after 2 days. Six months later, none of those people even speak to each other.

 

As a freshman I wouldn't worry about it. That's just how it is. As a junior if you still aren't making friends that might be a problem.

 

That said, most of the good friends I have now came from high school, not college. More history there.

[Hank Kingsley 0]

I already have 2 girls cellphone numbers.

 

 

Whoa whoa whoa, slow down there.

[LJSexay 0]

Same thing always happens for freshman. They form large groups and do everything in herds of 10+. Everyone seems to have a ton of friends after 2 days.

 

mmm definitely. I guess it depends, at first, on the kids you happen to live with/near. I was in a building FULL of strange extroverts with a sprinkling of introverts, and everyone was a big messy family all freakin year.

 

At the exact same time, my HS buddy was in a building with quiet, shy, very closed in folk. Yeah he made friends, but not like he would have.

 

Overall, after freshman year you start hanging more and more with kids you have classes with and do activities with... but I have yet to experience not meeting people, ever. The environment truly does make a difference sometimes.

[Special K 0]

i didn't go to university to make friends. those who do usually aren't as successful. there are exceptions, of course. but if i was to talk to make friends with anyone, it would be to find a mate. not a drinking buddy.

 

I don't think many people go just to make friends, but unless you're going to college in your home town, it's gonna be a really lonely time if you don't at least try to be sociable.

 

And if you're looking for a 'mate', you're going to come off as creepy if you don't have any friends. Unless you were using the 'g'day mate' sense of the word.

[Angle-plex 0]

I already have 2 girls cellphone numbers.

 

 

Whoa whoa whoa, slow down there.

 

Wow he's a lady's man huh.

[Guest Princess Leena]

Shouldn't an Olympian already have hundreds of ladies to fuck.