Making friends of the English Variety

For the first few weeks we were here I thought I would be alone forever! Ross was working 10 hours a day and I was left to piddle around the apartment cooking and cleaning, working on my writing and or exploring the city alone.  I love my alone time but this was an isolating aloneness.  I wanted to make some friends but I didn’t think it would be possible since there was nobody who spoke English and even if they did it wasn’t enough to actually have a good conversation.

Many of our friends here are through Ross’ work.  Most of the people at his company speak English to some degree and some quite well.  It has been great getting to know them and they have shown us a great deal of fun.  Daoiz has invited us on some great hikes and introduced us to his outdoors club.  They speak very little English but have been so lovely and inviting to us.  There is also Juan who has shown us a great metal bar and brought us into his crew!  It has been a lot of fun.  We also met Lloyd through Ross’ work.  He is from Australia and is teaching English to the company.  He has lived here for like 6 years so speaks very fluent Spanish and has introduced us to some great people.  We have gone hiking and kayaking with him and his friends as well as a great deal of drinking.

Luckily though because English here is so rare it really stands out when someone is speaking it.  Right away you are taken out of whatever you are doing and you search around like a crazy person for the source of familiar sounds!  This is how I have met most of my friends here. 

The first was Erin who has become my best friend here.  Ross and I were in a bookstore (which no longer exists and had no English books anyway) and Erin heard us talking.  She approached us and we had a nice conversation about how good it was to speak English.  Turns out she had moved here just a month before we had.  She is married to a man from Valladolid that she met 8 years before while she was studying abroad.  They had been living in the States for the past few years but he wanted to move back here.  So she didn’t really know anyone but his family.  She speaks Spanish fairly well though (so has now become my translator) We ended up parting ways and afterwards I was so angry at myself because it had not occurred to me to give her my number or ask if she would want to get coffee.

Some time went by and one day wandering by the river we heard someone yell “Hey!” in our direction.  We turned and saw Erin and I was so happy.  She expressed how she felt stupid for not giving me her number and since I had felt the same we had a good laugh and decided we should grab coffee soon.  It has now been 6 months since we met and I do not think I would have made it through without her!

We ended up meeting our friends Laura and Kevin this way as well.  We were in Ikea a couple months ago and Laura overheard us talking about pans.  She attacked us (her words) and we exchanged numbers.  They are here from Florida for eight months teaching English (as most foreigners here are) and they are just lovely people.  Again they both speak Spanish fairly well so they are helping teach us better ways to order beer!

 A few weeks ago I met Sarah and Heather.  Sarah is here from London and Heather from Scotland.  They are roommates and both teaching English for at least a year.  Erin and I were in a shop when Sarah overheard us talking and came over to ask where we were from.  We all went for a coffee and exchanged information.  Sarah then introduced us to Heather and we have all become good friends.  Sarah, Heather and I have even started going to zumba classes together.  None of us speak enough Spanish to understand much but together we do alright.

So my advice to anyone travelling abroad and having a hard time making friends or meeting people is just listen to the people around you, and when you here someone speaking your language say hello.  They are likely in a similar position as you or at least have been at one time.  We are all a little lost and it’s always nice to make new friends.  It makes life in a new place much easier and way more fun.  I never would have just said hello to random strangers to try and make friends in Canada but it just feels different when you are abroad.  It feels more comfortable.  You know that you will end up meeting like minded people who are looking to experience new places and meet new people.

There are also Intercambio (language exchanges) you can go to.  The idea is to speak both Spanish and English with people who are looking to learn and improve their language as well.  There are other languages that are spoken but it seems Spanish and English are the most common.  I do not go to these myself but some of my friends do and they seem to enjoy it.  One of the issues they have in these is that they speak very little Spanish the people they are talking to really want to learn English so they end up doing most of the conversing in English.  Good for making friends, but not so good for improving their Spanish.