We’re told that college is the time of our life to meet new people and form long-lasting relationships, but freshmen, introverts and students buckled into their studies are often left thinking, “Okay… but how?”
Every new school year, regardless of how the previous one went, there’s this looming uncertainty about how we’re going to be spending our weekends and who’ll be spending it with us. Will the year consist of solo Netflix marathons (nothing wrong with that) or group effort junk food runs?
Most universities provide students with resources to make friends and connect with new people. You can join clubs, introduce yourself to the other people on the floor where you live or seek out a study group. Even with these opportunities, the idea of meeting new people can still be intimidating.
When it comes to finding friends, don’t be afraid to just let life happen because trust me, it’ll happen. You’ll encounter awkward moments and embarrassing situations, but these moments can become the most significant ones in your life.
Here are three unconventional and unexpected situations I found myself in that led to me making real friends at college.
1. Getting locked out of the bathroom in my dorm.
My first day at college went a little like this.
9:00 a.m.: Woke up.
Rest of the day: Stayed in my room on my laptop until I really had to leave.
At around 2:00 in the afternoon I really had to leave.
I didn’t know anyone at school and the involvement fair on campus wasn’t going to happen until the first week of classes, so instead of wandering around campus by myself I decided to stay in my room and read the emails my professors had sent out to prepare myself for the first day of class. All day I was using my computer and drinking water.
To my complete horror, I learned that one of my suitemates locked me out of our shared bathroom. I barely knew my suitemates, or my roommate for that matter, and I spent a long time debating whether or not I should try to text one of them.
Was my opening line really going to be “Hey, no rush but when you get a chance can you please come back and unlock the bathroom door?”?
I eventually sent the text and didn’t wait for a reply before I left the building to head somewhere else. I think my suitemate was just as embarrassed as me, because as I was walking by myself I literally bumped into her and another girl speeding down a path. We recognized each other, laughed it off and they invited me to hang out with them.
I spent the rest of that night exploring campus with them, and as it would turn out, spent nearly every weekend after that with them too.
Who knew getting locked out of a bathroom could lead to meeting such great pe(e)ople?
2. “The One and Done”
Sweat trickled in a line down my back, my breath was uneven from my hike to class and out of all the empty seats in the auditorium at 8:30 a.m., a full half hour before lecture started, a girl chose to sit next to me.
“Hey, there are 1,000 other people in this room, take my number. I need to know at least one person in this class.”
Um, what? Had I heard that right?
It was early and I’m pretty sure I was delirious from the heat, but I found myself entering her number into my phone before I knew anything about her.
We survived the first lecture together and became friends through our mutual confusion of the class material. This led to me having someone to save me a seat in lecture, study with and eventually join an organization on campus with.
3. Window Wars
Like something out of Taylor Swift’s old “You Belong With Me” music video, my roommates and I decided one night this past week that it would be a great idea to write a note on a sign, tape it to the window and wait for responses. Hall meetings make everyone feel uncomfortable and icebreakers are the worst, so we thought it would be a better way to introduce ourselves to our neighbors.
Our apartment-style dorms have large windows, and whether we wanted to or not, we saw the people in the dorm across the courtyard from us dancing.
Courtesy: Tenor
We wrote a sign that said “Nice Moves” and went from there. We didn’t have high expectations and honestly weren’t expecting anyone to reply. We weren’t expecting to create a chain of window messages throughout the entire section of buildings across the courtyard from us.
Now, we communicate back and forth with four other apartments through messages on windows.
We all may or may not be attending a random midday dance battle in the future.