By Yaldaz Sadakova
Photo by Yaldaz Sadakova
I was an asshole to Raisa.
That’s not her real name, but I really was an asshole to her.
I had every intention of meeting her for coffee, of becoming acquaintances or even friends.
I was desperate for friends at the time.
That’s why I took her number and email. She wrote them down for me in her Eastern European handwriting—slanted to the right, similar to my own.
But then I blew her off.
I did it in the same passive-aggressive Western way that I’ve been blown off many times since I left Bulgaria more than a decade ago, when I was 23.
I met Raisa recently, at a vipassanā meditation retreat outside Toronto.
Throughout the 10 days of the retreat we weren’t allowed to talk—or read or write or watch anything. Our job was to just meditate for at least eight hours a day.
It was an extremely tedious and unnerving task. The whole thing made me—and most other meditators, from what I could tell—restless and antsy.
Raisa was one of the few meditators who seemed calm during her intimate encounter with herself.
Once while we were waiting in line for lunch in front of the canteen, I noticed that she wasn’t impatiently shifting her weight from one foot to the other like the rest of us.
She stood still with her eyes closed, and I imagined she was far away. In reality, she was probably focusing on her nostrils, noticing how her breath went in and out.
Raisa was tall and blonde. She seemed to be in her 40s. Her eyes were a stunning blue.
Unlike most of us, she’d been on this meditation retreat before.
The day after the retreat, when we were finally allowed to talk, I started chatting with Raisa in the dorm hallway. We’d just finished packing and were about to leave.
She had an Eastern European accent, somewhat similar to mine. Normally, that accent didn’t remind me of home, and neither did Eastern Europeans.
But at that moment, after 10 days of dredging up subconscious residue, I saw her as a reminder of home. Not home-home because Bulgaria wasn’t my only home any more, but one of my homes.
Raisa said she wasn’t working at the moment.
“But I’m happy because I don’t need a lot of money; I don’t need to buy much. I like my simple lifestyle,” she explained. “When I see something nice in a store, I just want to buy it for someone else.”
Then she told me she was from Russia, and her first few years in Canada had been difficult.
“I haven’t been able to work in my field,” she added. She’d been a doctor in Russia.
That didn’t surprise me. Canada is notorious for its Canadian experience requirement.
You could be the most skilled person, but if your work experience doesn’t come from Canada, many Canadian employers are likely to dismiss it—though they claim to value diversity. It might take you years to become re-certified in Canada.
Which is why the country is filled with bilingual engineers, doctors and journalists driving cabs. Or waiting tables.
“I totally get it,” I said. “This Canadian experience bullshit is pure discrimination. I’ve had to deal it, too. Every immigrant I know here has had to deal with it.”
Then Raisa mentioned she had a thyroid autoimmune condition.
“My thyroid is overactive. I have to take medication all the time,” she explained.
“Oh really? I’m having thyroid issues myself,” I said. “Just before the retreat, I went to the doctor, and he said my thyroid is inflamed.”
Then, out of nowhere, I added, “Everything has been so difficult, so difficult!”
These last words just spilled out of me. Suddenly, I burst into tears and hugged Raisa. She hugged me back and started sobbing, too.
I didn’t say it to her, but the reason I was sobbing was because I was tired of fighting an uphill struggle.
Tired of fighting for every single thing—for the types of opportunities people around me got much more easily thanks to their inherited privilege.
Tired of being the underdog, the outsider, the foreigner at the mercy of visas, immigration rules and discrimination.
Tired of not having enough friends and a social network.
Tired of seeing only the bad in my circumstances.
Tired of my victimhood mentality.
Raisa and I sobbed for a few minutes, holding each other tightly, my face on her shoulder.
Then she scribbled her contact information for me on a piece of paper. We wheeled out our suitcases.
In front of the dorm, we hugged one final time before parting.
“Sorry, what was your name?” Raisa asked.
I emailed her when I came back home. She replied, including emoticons—hearts and flowers.
When I responded, I also included a heart because I wanted to reciprocate, though I thought it was weird to put hearts in a message for someone you barely know.
We agreed that we should meet soon—specifically, that I should let her know when I was free to grab coffee.
Well, I never let her know when I’d be free.
I felt guilty for blowing Raisa off.
But in my defense, I lived two hours away from her.
And I was busy. The lamest of excuses, I know, the busy excuse.
It’s more accurate to say that at the time I was feeling overwhelmed and defeated, by work and life in general. I cried about the smallest things and had terrible insomnia. I felt like I was wading through muck all the time.
But the real reason why I blew off Raisa wasn’t that I was feeling overwhelmed.
The real reason was that I didn’t think we had much in common, other than meditation, thyroid issues and immigrantness. I didn’t feel enough of an intellectual spark or kinship, even though we cried together.
I’ve never been interested in friendship of circumstance. It’s not something I can pull off emotionally. There has to be more than circumstance to tie me to someone.
But back at the meditation retreat, my loneliness made me override my judgment and see Raisa as a potential rebound friend.
Coffee Would Be Great, But
A couple of months before I met Raisa, I was already feeling lonely and isolated.
I’d just moved an hour away from downtown Toronto.
And I’d just left my full-time magazine job to work on my own. Not spending my days in a busy loud office made me realize that I didn’t have close friends in Toronto.
I’d been in the area for over three years, but one of my initial friends had moved to England. Another one I’d fallen out with.
My remaining three friends were busy with their jobs and families. And now I lived an hour away from two of them. Which is why we had to plan at least a week in advance if we wanted to get together.
That never bothered me when I had an office job, but now it did.
I thought the solution was to make more friends.
So one day I emailed an acquaintance to grab coffee, somebody I knew through work.
It took me a while to craft the email. I wondered if she really wanted to see me, or if she was just being polite when she’d said we should meet up.
Before I sent her the email, I read and reread it. I edited it endlessly, as if I was writing an article or a cover letter for a dream job.
I deleted an exclamation mark, then added it again—only to delete it once again. I didn’t want to sound like I was coming on too strong. But I didn’t want to sound aloof and matter-of-fact either.
I didn’t want to sound too formal and hard-to-get. But I didn’t want to be too familiar either.
The acquaintance in question responded, saying she was busy, but she’d try to carve out some time. After some back and forth over the span of two weeks, we agreed on a day.
Then, on the morning of our coffee date, she emailed to ask if we could meet at an earlier time that day, in the morning, because something had come up.
I’d woken up late, and it was going to take me more than an hour to get to her—I’d suggested a location that would be closer to her. So I couldn’t make it that morning.
We agreed to reschedule.
She told me the next month would be busy, but she would get back to me when things calmed down.
I felt like I was trying to make an appointment with none other than the Canadian prime minister.
I have yet to hear from her.
A few days later, I emailed another acquaintance to grab coffee, again somebody I knew through work.
We’d had coffee a couple of times already. We’d bonded by swapping stories about our immigrantness and adjusting to life in Canada. She’d been in Canada for years.
Acquaintance No. 2 responded immediately, saying it was great to hear from me, and coffee would be great.
However, she said she was busy on the dates I’d suggested, so she’d email me soon with new proposed dates.
I have yet to hear from her as well.
A week later, I messaged a third acquaintance to grab coffee. She too was somebody I’d met through work.
We were both relatively new to Canada, and we’d connected over that. We’d already had coffee outside of work a couple of times. I thought it had gone well—we’d shared in-depth conversations. I hoped we could become friends.
She never responded to my message.
A couple of months later, I texted a fourth acquaintance about grabbing coffee, somebody I’d just met at a gathering.
She’d asked me at the gathering a bunch of questions about my vegan diet, mainly about cooking vegan food.
I’d mentioned a simple Indian dish of potatoes with cauliflower that I like to make, aloo gobi, and she’d expressed interest in it.
“If you give me your number, I’ll text you the aloo gobi recipe,” I’d told her at the end of the night.
I didn’t know how else to get her contact info without seeming creepy.
And I wanted her contact info badly. Even though I didn’t feel any kinship with her. Even though it didn’t look like we had anything in common other than an interest in healthy food.
I was lonely, so I couldn’t be picky.
She did give me her phone number. The next day I texted her the recipe.
A few days later, Acquaintance No. 4 texted back to let me know she’d just made the aloo gobi, and it was great.
Then I asked her about grabbing coffee. During the gathering, she’d mentioned meeting up.
Now she said coffee would be great, but the next month was busy, so she’d let me know when things calmed down.
I have yet to hear from her also.
After I didn’t hear back from these four women, I didn’t contact them. I wasn’t sure about the Canadian etiquette in these situations. But my guess was that I shouldn’t get in touch.
I suspected the communication might be unwanted. These women were likely trying to let me off the hook without saying it directly, so by contacting them again, I’d thwart their plans.
Or, I feared, if I contacted them again, they might feel forced to go out with me, but they won’t enjoy it, and they’ll resent me.
The Bulgarian way would have been to message them after not hearing from them and say directly: “What happened? You were supposed to let me know about our coffee date.” (“Какво стана? Нали щеше да ми отговориш, нали щяхме да ходим на кафе.”)
And, if you’re the super direct type, which I am not, you could add, “If you didn’t want to meet up, you should have told me so instead of jerking me around.” (“Ако не си искала да се видим, да ми беше казала, а не да ме разиграваш.”)
But my guess was that these kinds of statements would sound way too rude in Canada. How-dare-you-talk-to-me-like-that rude.
However, there’s something to be said about the direct Bulgarian approach. When you take it, you know exactly where you stand with people, and they know where they stand with you.
What kills me about the Canadian way—and the American way, from my experience—is that people act like you’re their best friend, and they tell you that you should totally get together, but when you take them up on their word, they can’t bother to respond to your message or to make time for you.
Then you feel like you fell for an obvious scam.
But I’m being a hypocrite!
I don’t have the right to criticize the Canadian and American approach because I’ve adopted it myself. It feels easy and convenient when I use it on other people. But it hurts when they use it on me.
All this to say: I understand the four women who blew me off.
Most people don’t let you into their friendship circle easily—especially if they already have a social network in the country you’re new to. And they’re busy, which means they can only make time for real friends, not for someone they barely know.
This is why new immigrants often befriend other new immigrants. Everyone else, including the long-time immigrants, is often too busy to make time for us. It’s not that we refuse to integrate.
But I can’t blame people who don’t have room for new friends. Look what I did to Raisa.
Death by Small Talk
I used to think that moving from one country to another is what exacerbates the task of making friends as a busy adult.
You go somewhere new and by the time you make a couple of friends with people who do want to expand their friend network, you leave the country. Or your friends leave the country. I gravitate towards people who like to leave.
This is why most of my friends are scattered around the world.
Now I think this is only part of the reason why I find it hard to make new friends every time I move.
The bigger reason is my personality.
Because over the years I’ve seen many people make friends as soon as they move to a new country. They’re the outgoing, talkative people who attend a ton of parties and group activities because that’s what energizes them.
I’m the opposite.
It takes me forever to make new friends because I don’t meet new people easily.
All the activities that energize me are solitary—reading, creative writing, walking, running.
I could do my fun activities with another person. But then these activities aren’t relaxing anymore, and I get deprived of my alone time, which makes me feel depleted and grouchy.
If I go for a walk with someone else, for example, I’m not in an off mode. I’m on. I can’t let my mind wander. I’m focused on the other person, on their experience of our conversation.
I also hate groups. I prefer one-on-one interactions.
In groups, there’s always the risk that I could be in the spotlight. Having all eyes on me makes me uncomfortable.
My other problem with groups is that the conversation is rarely personal or in-depth. Group conversations usually center on mundane safe topics and small talk.
And I hate mundane topics and small talk.
I can do a little bit of that at the beginning of a conversation, but that’s it. I rarely know what to say beyond the obvious weather and traffic stuff.
I always wonder how some people can chatter away forever about this new laptop they bought or about how they fixed their radiator. They go on and on as if their radiator or laptop is the most riveting subjecting ever.
I prefer in-depth conversations about feelings and ideas, about books and creativity, about psychology and mindfulness, about politics and social issues.
These conversations can also tire me in the sense that I’ll need alone time afterwards to digest the content.
But they don’t waste my energy. They put it to good use because they expand my knowledge and teach me something vital about someone. That way I can connect with them more meaningfully.
Talking about radiators and laptops just wastes my energy. It’s the psychological equivalent of empty calories.
I wish that “What are you reading right now?” or “What ideas have you been thinking about lately?” was a more common conversation starter than “How are you?”
There’s just one problem with deep conversations. People mistype me.
It happens when I have these conversations with people who don’t know me well.
Some of these people assume that I’m an outgoing, extroverted person—because I’m friendly and approachable during my interactions with them.
So they start to treat me like an extrovert. And when I don’t respond favorably to that, they feel puzzled or rejected.
If I explain that I’m introverted, they’re surprised. “But you’re so friendly, so good with people!” they protest.
They mean well. But they wrongly assume that us introverts are awkward, standoffish people incapable of human connection.
They think that if they talk to me for hours and tell me deeply personal things, if they feel understood with me, surely I must be an extroverted, people person.
And then they ask me to do something “fun.” Like shopping or going to a party.
Things often go downhill from there.
Photo by Yaldaz Sadakova
It drives me nuts that so many people wrongly equate introvert with misanthrope. Sure, some introverts lack interpersonal skills—but so do many extroverts I’ve met.
Introversion comes in several flavors, and it has nothing to do with interpersonal skills.
Introversion simply has to do with the fact that your attention naturally goes first to your inner world. That your ideas, thoughts, visions, feelings and dreams stimulate you more than the external world. That you’re in your comfort zone when you engage with your inner world.
However, introverts do have extroverted qualities and vice versa.
We all have both introverted and extroverted tendencies, but one is always more dominant than the other.
“Flirting for Friends”
Here’s one big reason why making friends as a busy adult often feels harder than dating: we don’t have nearly as many guidelines for friendship as we do for romance.
“We don’t have platonic pickup lines memorized,” Shasta Nelson writes in her book Friendships Don’t Just Happen!
“Flirting for friends seems creepy. Asking for her phone number like we’re going to call her up for a Saturday night date is just plain weird.”
We think that when we were kids, friendships used to happen automatically, but that’s not true, Nelson writes; what happened automatically was seeing other kids regularly, without scheduling it.
This consistency is, of course, a key requirement for friendship.
“A romantic relationship would never get off the ground if two people went out for a date, then ended the evening saying, ‘That was fun…we should do it again next month,’ ” Nelson writes.
“When it comes to love, we clear our calendar for every possibility. Yet with friendship, it somehow seems normal to only see each other every couple of weeks or months.”
In romance, we also know the rules about who should pursue who, but with friendship it isn’t clear who the pursuitor should be, so a lot of times the momentum with an acquaintance doesn’t start, Nelson notes.
The ALDO Shoes Friend
Right after I was blown off four times, I felt particularly jealous of anyone with close local friends.
Friends you know so well that you can ask each other for help without feeling awkward, without prefacing the request with “I hope things are well” or “No pressure, but I was wondering if you could by any chance” or some other type of business language.
Friends you can hang out with on short notice, without planning days and weeks in advance, without feeling that you’re intruding when you message them about getting together.
I had none of those friends.
I felt particularly jealous one winter night when I went to a surprise birthday party.
I’ll call the birthday woman Lisa.
While we were waiting for Lisa to come home, I felt so resentful that nobody would throw me a surprise party because I didn’t have enough friends in this country to invite to a party.
Now that I think about it, I’m not sure why I felt this way, given that I don’t like parties and groups. Like I said, I prefer to meet people one on one.
After Lisa came home and we yelled “surpriiiise,” we all headed to a nearby restaurant for dinner. Lisa teetered along in her high cream heels, a friend supporting her on each side.
While she was putting on her heels back in the house, just before leaving for dinner, one of the party guests had asked, “Are these the ALDO shoes?”
So they bought these shoes together—they go shopping together like real girlfriends, I’d thought.
Again, as I write this now, I’m not sure why I felt jealous, given that I hate shopping. And more than that, I hate shopping with another person because then I have to stand around and wait while they try things on.
When we got to the restaurant, a cozy French bistro, I purposely sat next to The ALDO Shoes Friend. I wanted to impress her and see if she could become my friend, too.
She was around my age, and she seemed sweet and cool. She definitely had a good fashion sense, judging from her stylish bob and her silk knee-length vest in olive green.
So I did what I normally do when I try to impress someone: I started asking her personal questions so she could feel I was interested in her. Which I truly was.
I asked how she knew Lisa.
“We worked together. We actually met only two years ago, but we really hit it off. It’s like I’ve known her forever,” she said. “When I met her, I was like, ‘Where have you been all my life?’ ”
I felt a pang of envy. Why hadn’t I been able to meet a friend like that?
Then The ALDO Shoes friend mentioned that she was born in the Middle East. I thought this was my big opportunity.
After all, I knew a lot about what it’s like to be foreign-born. The belonging issues. The identity issues. The cultural schizophrenia.
“So do you feel more Canadian or more Middle Eastern?” I asked.
I was hoping she’d launch into a vulnerable account about her identity and belonging issues, which would allow me to mention my own struggles with belonging—which would establish that we had something powerful in common.
“Well, we immigrated to Canada when I was small,” she said. “So yeah, I definitely feel Canadian. My whole family is here. Toronto is definitely my home.”
How frustrating. She didn’t have belonging issues. However, I was on the friend prowl. I wasn’t going to give up easily.
I decided to ask The ALDO Shoes Friend about her job. I thought that subject should work because her line of work seemed interesting.
“What made you decide to work in nutrition?” I asked.
My hope was that her life passion was somehow involved in her profession. That way, I could still get her to reveal meaningful stuff and bond with me.
But all she had to say was, “Um, it was a bit of an accident?”
I was running out of topics. I was racking my brains about what I should ask next when I spotted the server on her way to our table.
Maybe we could talk about special diets! Maybe I could draw her attention to the couscous with veggies I had ordered—the only vegan item on the menu. This would hopefully spark a discussion about my veganness.
Well, that plan didn’t work either. As soon as we got our food, The ALDO Shoes Friend started cutting her steak, slowly turned her back to me and began listening to the conversation on the other side of the table.
Clearly, she had no idea how high the stakes were for me.
Friend Types
Photo by Yaldaz Sadakova
Part of the reason why I was overly eager to befriend The ALDO Shoes Friend and then Raisa was that I’d just finished Shasta Nelson’s book Friendships Don’t Just Happen!
I’d picked up the book because I feared there was a crucial friend-making skill that I lacked. Otherwise, why would it be so hard for me to succeed at something that came so easily to others?
In that book, Nelson urges you to always look for new friends because at least some of your current friendships will end or weaken due to circumstance.
I knew Nelson has a financial incentive to argue this because she teaches friendship workshops.
Still, her advice sounded logical; her observations rang true for me. And, like I said, I was lonely.
Nelson says you need to ensure you have friends in each of the five friend categories she identifies because each category serves a different purpose.
The first category Nelson identifies is called Contact Friends.
These are the weakest type of friends. You know them because your kids play together, or a mutual friend has introduced you. You don’t know the name of their spouse or invite them for dinner. You’d never call them to chat because something’s bothering you.
The second category is called Common Friends.
You spend more time with these people and “in more intentional and personal ways,” Nelson writes. You have a one-on-one relationship with these friends.
Next are Community Friends.
You spend time together regularly with Community Friends, and you share your lives beyond your initial common interest. These friends aren’t limited to a specific area of your life. These are people you feel comfortable inviting to a random event and checking with about their weekend plans. They share their big moments with you. You continue to be friends even if the initial thing that bound you—for example, a job—disappears.
The closest friends are Committed Friends.
These are people you regularly see and share feelings with. You have “a mutual commitment to be present, no matter what,” Nelson writes. You plan for their birthdays. You know about their dreams and fears.
Confirmed Friends are the last category.
Confirmed Friends are people you used to be close friends with, and you still feel close to them, but you no longer have regular contact with them, and they’re not part of your daily life anymore. When you meet, you pick up where you left.
Most of my friends are Confirmed Friends who are spread across different countries. It does warm my heart to know that I have them, that we share a close connection, that we can help each other, and that when we meet it’s as if no time has passed.
But these old friends can’t have dinner with me tomorrow or spend this Saturday with me. Nor can I do that for them. Old long-distance friends are like illiquid assets.
It’s Not Them, It’s Me
A couple of years ago, I had dinner in Toronto with a woman who was visiting from Ottawa.
Like me, Jen had lived in several countries.
She said that her strategy was to take contract jobs in different countries, to go wherever her work took her.
Then we started talking about making friends in a new country and maintaining ties with old ones.
“I no longer have a close friend I can talk to every day because I’ve been moving so much,” I told Jen.
“I’m in the same situation,” Jen said. “But because I haven’t had such a friend for years, I no longer need one. I’m used to it now.”
I didn’t realize it when Jen said this, but now I think I’m like her.
What I want is just the option of having such a friend. But I don’t actually need or want to talk to a friend like that every day. I like and need my time alone. This type of daily interaction would wear me out.
This became clear to me only recently, when one of my Toronto friends separated from her husband.
Within a couple of weeks, my friend and I discussed the breakup on the phone every day or every other day, for at least half an hour. We also met a couple of times during that two-week period.
I was totally fine with our in-person conversations. I was happy to listen, ask questions and offer emotional support.
But the phone calls tired me, even though I initiated some of them.
It had nothing to do with my friend. She’s not an emotional vampire. I just hate talking on the phone in general.
If the conversation is intense, personal and long, the way these conversations were, I hate not being able to see the other person’s body language. I hate missing the opportunity to connect in a deeper way.
The post-breakup calls with my friend made me realize that I crave the benefits of close friendships, but my disposition makes it hard for me to put in all the necessary work to sustain these types of friendships.
Because what if a friend needs me on a day when I’ve already exhausted my social interaction quota?
Giving the Introvert Way
Shortly after I blew Raisa off, I gave up trying to make new friends in Toronto.
This friend-seeking frenzy was starting to drive me crazy.
Maybe it’s something that could work well for someone who gains energy from being around people and socializing.
I lose energy in those situations.
I can’t fight my introvert nature. When I do, I let others down and become the kind of person I’m not proud of.
Look how I broke my promise to Raisa.
When I meet new people now, I don’t size them up as potential friends. I don’t try to impress them and go out with them. I’m not on the friend prowl anymore.
I want to let new friendships happen naturally.
Because when I think about the friendships I’ve formed over the years, they all started organically.
In each instance, I shared enough important things with the other person, and there was a spark, so the other person was also interested.
I didn’t have to push or audition to be their friend.
In fact, it was usually my friends who found me in my own little world and initiated things in the early stages.
It’s best for me to focus on my relationships with the local friends I do have. But do it in a way that’s aligned with my introversion.
This means that I can’t do long phone calls every night for a long stretch. But I’ll check out their art. I’ll read their short stories or their novel manuscripts.
I can’t go bowling, clubbing, swimming or camping with them. But when they talk, I’ll give them my undivided attention and empathy.
And so on.
We all give in different ways. Mine is the introvert way. The INFJ way, to be precise.
And We Meet Again
A couple of months ago, almost a year after I blew off Raisa in the lamest of ways, I went to the same vipassanā meditation retreat.
Guess who was there? Raisa, of course.
I wondered what the universe was trying to tell me when I spotted her in the crowd, before the meditation course began.
Raisa looked exactly the same as the previous year: tall, serene, gracious. Her blonde hair was again stylishly coiffed but a bit shorter than last time.
I felt embarrassed and guilty. But I went up to her. Pretending not to see her would have been even lamer.
She smiled and greeted me with a tight hug, as if she was meeting an old friend.
“I owe you an apology! I never got in touch with you about our coffee,” I blurted out nervously.
“It’s okay!” she said and smiled again.
“No, I feel bad!”
“You know what? Forget about it!” Her expression was forgiving. It seemed to say that she understood. ♦
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