FB statuses, friendships & everything in between

The thing about FB statuses are that they are just, only al-most right!
I mean, they may tell you the factual truth but carry with it none of your emotion, because you don't want to be telling the 300 or whatever 'friends' that yes, I may be going out to brunch with people who could technically be called friends, and yes, I am having 'friends' over for drinks in the evening, but the disconnection is so vast, that at the end of the day, I just feel cheap for pandering to people with whom I share nothing.

I have been reading a whole lot of bloggers lately who have been talking about the dearth of friends in their adopted countries.
After having been in this country for the past seven years, I can attest to how difficult it is to find people whose company does not make you want to gauge your eyes out.
The thing about moving to a new place (be it a new country, new state or even new town) is you go through so many trials and errors before you are reasonably comfortable in the friends dept.
When I first came here, I was not looking for friends so much as acquaintances with slight commonalities to hang out with because I was not looking to add to my deep and - abiding over the years - friendships.
But if there was going to new, deep and abiding over the year friends, I was specific about their qualifications.

1. They had to be like me - have had some sort of expat experience & find South Park funny.
   

That's all I wanted. But I might as well have asked for the moon from the Midwestern & Indian schoolmates, colleagues I came across.
Having pub hopped, unextensively, across India & Dubai, I was not as widely enamored of pubs, drinks, and making out and would only do any or all of three when the mood hit me. I liked dancing but did not feel the need to get drunk before I did. I liked hanging out with the International club because I really found it fascinating to meet a Turkish Jew (hola L!) who discussed individual vs. collective identities, a Canadian Swede who had gone ashram hopping in India, a Trinidanian basketball player who loved Indian spices, and so on and so forth.
I had fascinating international encounters and experiences, but did go through intense periods of loneliness, at the end of which I was blessed with the Redheaded white girl, who though I share no ethnic anything with, had the two things I most wanted - a world view and a love of South Park.
And of course, a short time later, the boy! (who interestingly enough didn't have the expat experience but loved South Park. I gave him a shot because he had lovely hair)

Of the true friends I have made here, are three Americans, a Bangladeshi Nigerian (who's not the boy), and an Indian and gawd, all my wonderful, brilliantly humored ex-boss and ex-colleagues, who all happen to be v.white.
The reason I am trumping out their ethnic backgrounds is because I need to remind myself that common ethnic backgrounds is not always a precursor to enjoyable friendships.

I have not met a single Malayalee here (and I am discounting the blog friends :)) who I could hang out with, or a single Indian (save for my lovely giggly friend, and again I am discounting blog friends) with whom I could carry out a conversation, and not for lack of trying.

And yet, I keep falling for 'brown = friends'
(I wish I could get something more rhyming than that. Brown is not always down with me?, Brown may not be able to clown with me"???)

Take yesterday, for example.
The brunch was a working social brunch with Indian colleague friends of boy's (who because of two year association of going to pub/club/& other general hangouts have now sort of become social buddies)
We met, we worked, and in between, get call from newly married couple friends about drinks & poker plan at our place for evening, and the boy & I say sure - everybody can come over.

Some people can be extremely relaxed about hosting, like the boy - who's a great host but really does not go overboard about pre-host planing or is not too verklempt about entertaining responsibilities. I grew up watching my perfectionist parents pre-plan, pre-clean and run dinner parties which ran well past midnight with the perfect grace, the perfect party activities, and the perfect food (all brilliantly thought out - finger food for children, diabetic appetizers for the older ones, junk looking but not nutritionally lacking food for the teenagers, sumptuous main course)
I feel, as their daughter, I would be doing them a disservice if I didn't try (just a little bit) to match their faultless hosting.
So when peeps tell you they are having a poker party at your place in 6 hours, I go into hosting mode about party food, buying drinks to suite alcoholic/non-alcoholic tastes, and out comes the cooking utensils and car (not necessarily used together).
We had the standard chips and guacamole, baked fries, and my new baking venture, single serving mini-cheese cakes.
And beer and some fake wine.
We go through our microscopic cleaning ritual (for which the boy reluctantly joins in), prepare our food, change into party dress and wait.

And wait

And wait.

And about 15 minutes after the hour when everybody is supposed to show up, we get call from Person-who-suggested-the-whole-damn-thing-A that Person-B will not be showing up because Person-B is not feeling too well (but well enough to attend working brunch) & so really, is there something else we want to be doing, like going out for dinner, or maybe postpone the whole affair for another weekend etc?

It chafes me to no end that people can be so immaturely circuitous about things.
Since this is the second time this has happened to us with these bunch of people, I wish I could send them out a memo that says:

"You do not have to say YES to every social engagement suggested by us or anybody else. But if you do say YES & change your mind at a later date, then you can just simply call up the day before and say - hey, sorry but just found out that I really can't make it.
If it is the day of the engagement, perhaps calling up about (even) 2 hrs before engagement and saying above is also perfectly acceptable.
This also works if you are the one who suggested social engagement but find out later that the group you thought were going to be present has drastically reduced in number.
But what is unacceptable is calling host and steering conversation around the lines of - "oh, well, B will not be coming, so do YOU think we should cancel, or do YOU think we should postpone for a later day?" and forcing host to abdicate you of your responsibility of saying - 'sorry I can't make it!'
It is not a popularity contest, my sadly immature friend. When you say 'I can't make it', our host hearts are not broken and since we already know you are flaky, no worries about that either."
End of memo.

The boy had picked up the phone, which is really great, because he really is the DEAD SEA. Calmness flows in and around him.
But he is also extremely manipulative. He says no to various plans suggested by flaky friend, and makes her & husband come over.

I don't know what the point of that is - for me, if somebody does not want to come over, they don't need to. For the boy, if somebody suggests a poker party at our place, makes us prepare ourselves for them (I had to take a bath is really the ultimate 'I made the effort for them' yardstick for him), and if they are too silly to say 'sorry we changed our minds' and instead do even sillier mind games with us, then they fracking better come over so we can give it to them!
And his way of giving it to them is so greatly different from mine.
No flailing over hot coals for them. Just a sardonic 'What is it, person A? You don't go anywhere without your little babysitter person B?"
& then watch them squirm out a reply, and then talk a bit, give food, ignore a lot by playing video game (the hostess inside me cringes), and generally make them feel quite bad and wish they had just never gotten out of bed in the morning.

I didn't let him carry out his routine because really I am so tired of mind games.
The boy said his sardonic statement.
The flaky girl squirmed. Her husband looked nonchalantly on.
Topic threshed out a v.tiny bit.
And drinks and food given out, and conversation abounds.

And after half an hour or so, I just felt dirty and cheap.
Because really, I should've let the boy do his thing and made them go away.

Because I hate having to talk to 28 year old recently married women:

• who expounds their theory that all single girls need to hurry up and get married, especially her 27 year old girl friends because it's already too late. And because I shamefully did not state my mind but only did my eyebrow lifting thing & my 'Really?' look I will say it now -
  
• UGH. UGH. UGH. There's absolutely nothing wrong with waiting and there is no proper age for getting married, unless of course you are going the whole arranged marriage route because then you have to go by market standards, I suppose. And having gotten married at 30, and having a mother who got married, in her day and age, at 25 (as opposed to flaky girl's mother who got married at 15 - but who still has more feminist gumption than flaky girl herself and who's unafraid at being different, so much so that her gay nephew's partner is routinely asked to sit in on pujas and other social whatnots at their super conservative, almost joint-familish functions), and having a mother-in-law who didn't, in Bangladesh (which I admit, I always thought was populated by submissive women who were getting beaten up regularly) change her maiden name after marriage because she didn't feel like it, I take personal affront at her silly statement and at the fact that I didn't say - WHAT ROT!!! Get out!
  

• who giggles hysterically and admits freely that she just is a bit on the silly trusting side and is not street savvy because in Mumbai, which apparently terrifies her Marwari roots (???!!!), she allowed a con man to dupe her out of Rs. 500 at tourist temple because he promised her a special darshan of the diety. She giggled. She lowered her eyelashes and did the 'ain't I just adorable for being such a silly girl' thing, while her husband told her she was really dumb and could not be trusted in cities.
  And then turns around and asks me if going to the North of India terrifies me??

Why? Because I am a South Indian, and
oh-lordy-me-how-eveer-shall-I-fare-with-these-Hindi-wielding-strangers? Oh I do believe I am getting the vapors at the v. thought of it.

• I am glad to say I didn't let that pass and tried (but failed) to be suave in my answer about the time when the redheaded white girl & I had gone to India to see the Taj and were given a detour to 'special' temple by our artful tour guide, where to enter you would have to pay Rs. 2000 and to get a darshan, you had to pay another Rs. 2000, especially if you happen to be white or an NRI. When I said no thanks, the tour guide goaded me by saying perhaps I was not Indian enough because I must be a Christian. And I gave him rather long lecture on patriotism & secularism in Hindi & told him to take us back before my police commissioner of an uncle arrests his annoying ass.
  

I am not advocating standing up to every conman, irrespective of the hazard.
I know that there are genuinely gullible people who have the misfortune of getting conned by tricksters. And I know of people who, because they are dreaming of v.funny, magical things at the bus stop, get their purse snatched but when they are made aware of situation, do funny things to get purse back; and when they tell you these stories make them into such adventurous and funny tales that you wish you were there.

What I dislike is silly women who giggle mercilessly at their helplessness at not being street savvy and equating that to some sort of feminine trait.
If you are unfortunate enough to be born credulous, (& boring) then, like Mr.T, I pity you. But please do not advertise this as some sort of endearing quality that makes you that much more feminine .

Long. rant. over.

We got rid of them. And the one thought in my head was how glad I was that, hopefully, she would be moving soon to New Jersey, and that any future progeny of mine would not have to go
through a cleansing lecture on how Aunty Flakey is differently abled, and so must never, ever be really listened to (by you).