Single Girl in the City #GuestPost

Posted in Aks Corner, Friendship, GuestPost, Love & Relationships, Self Love, Women@Work

Spring of 2003 saw me move into digs of my own; I was able to rent a modest two-room set which was pretty decent for my needs. I was excited to be that single girl in the city and couldn’t wait to have get together and sleep overs at my place.

Earlier I had been living with relatives and so hadn’t even begun to make friends in the city for fear of it being frowned upon. But the change in accommodation status meant this was no longer a hindrance.

In those days Orkut was gaining some momentum while Yahoo chat was the most preferred option to chat online. I looked up some chat rooms but found them to be sleazy hook up sites with no way of knowing who you are chatting with.

Then I stumbled on a website called Meetup.com that let one make a meetup group based on mutual interest and select a venue in the city where everyone could gather at a mutually selected time and day. This sounded promising and I immediately signed up on a few. Soon enough one of them had reasonable number of members to make it eligible to go live.

India Habitat centre was an upcoming spot in those days, and was chosen to be the meetup destination. Eager and excited I landed up there to find a bedraggled bunch of folks, each single/new to the city, overworked and struggling to keep their head above water. There were three girls in a bunch of 13 and the men there were simply looking for a “date”.  I went for a couple more of these meetups but the story remained the same. There was no ways to check who was who and what really were they all about.

Cut to 2015 when Facebook and Twitter had made great inroads into the social fabric; so much so that even your maid was on facebook – not kidding!

Facebook became a breeding ground for communities/groups of likeminded individuals based on common interest like reading, cooking, hiking, photography, work networking, etc. One could check out the profiles of members, group admins regulated discipline and decorum in the online interface. Soon the groups started to branch into sub groups based on location too.

One can interact with others on these groups, plan events for a meetup and eventually bond as friends over mutual interests.

In my current friend circle, 75% of folks are the ones I met online in such groups/discussions who soon evolved into a large kin of fun loving friends to hang out with. Not just that, their other friends who they met in a similar manner are also part of this circle and increase the bonhomie by greater measures.

What I really find amazing about this social development is the security and ease of meeting like-minded people whom you can trust since you have been interacting with them for long on a social network. Though there can be some who could mislead but that chance is slight ( in my opinion) as it’s easy enough to check out the credentials of online folks vis-à-vis the six degree of separation which has greatly reduced, thanks to Facebook and our incessant need to stay connected with everyone we meet.

I am blessed to have an amazing sisterhood of friends and the tribe is growing day by day as one keeps meeting more such folks who are genuinely out to make friends for conversations, good times and the love of it.

How about you – what’s your opinion on online friends?

About Shalzmojo

_MG_2665 pdf
An interior designer by profession, writing is a passion which coupled with travel love
blossomed into this blog where I love to just “do my thing”! Be it recipes, food events, travel jaunts, fiction dreaming or even meditative musings; all of it’s taken up quite passionately on my blog. I am a serious wine guzzler and love to chase butterflies in my free time.
Pls do check out my post on Meetups
This post is written for the December bloghop #mymojo with Shalzmojo
Linking up for #wordsante with Namysaysso for every post deserves some love

 

Published by Akshata Ram

Chartered Accountant, Story Teller, Dreamer, Voracious Reader, Blogger, Mommy to a little munchkin, Shopaholic, Day Dreamer.Passionate about my career in the corporate world and aspire to break the glass ceiling, at the same time nurture my passion for writing. My niche area is short stories, I also write on parenting, sexism, life's experiences, micro blogs and flash fiction. I have won the best Parenting blog post at mycity4kids.com the largest parenting website in India, 4 times and several of my posts have been published in the #MostPopular category on this site garnering millions of views. I also write on Bonobology, Rivo Kids, Women's Web and Youth Ki Awaaz. My blog has been chosen as the Top Indian Blogs for the years 2018-2019,2020 by TopIndianBlogs website and found a place in the prestigious Top 22 Indian Literary Blogs in 2020 @TopIndianBlogs.

24 thoughts on “Single Girl in the City #GuestPost”

  4. Oh I remember those orkut and yahoo chat days! I only used to add people i personally know and we used have those talks on yahoo sometimes even played antakshari on yahoo messenger via calls 😛 Those were fun days! In my friend circle i was one of the last persons who stayed on orkut until very last days. Though Facebook and other social media prevailed over the years I miss orkut and yahoo messenger chats with my friends! No to foget the fun we used to have sending doodles and that one audio message which was my fav “Hello..Echo…anybody there” 😀

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. You are prob one of the first people to tell me that they liked Orkut…. I used to hate it and got fed up of it very soon; whihc is why I took ages to get onto FB as I didnt want another orkut type thingy. Antakshari over Yahoo sound sinteresting; I havent explored this at all!!

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  5. I have always maintained, that women who live alone, and work in a city away from home, are brave and street smart – the kind women all over need to be. So proud of you, Shalz..and I am glad you made some good friends in the online world, too. Good for you, gal!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  6. I admire all you brave girls who have lived alone . I have stayed away from home as a student but that doesn’t really count because I was in a hostel. I wonder what I’d do if I’m really all on my own. And frankly I am scared of online relationships because you really never know the real person so you ?

    Like

    Reply

    1. Sadly I never got to expereince hostel life and I guess I have made it up vis single living 😉 Trust me if you cam cohabit with strangers then living on your own is no big thing! I am sure you will rock it!!
      Yup online relationships can be very scary but I have seen some positive ones too aorund me via it; so I guess each to their own!!!:-)

      Like

      Reply

  8. Omg Orkut! Thanks for reminding me of that one.

    I have hardly met any of my online friends can’t really comment on online friendships. I truly did believe for the longest time that it is unsafe to meet ppl who you chance upon online. It’s good to know you have met folks with mutual interest through fb.

    I think I would love to meet many from this blogging community

    Like

    Reply

    1. I have been blessed with some terrific friendships via online communities and have found them to be more real than real life folks; then again some have been folks with a bipolar disorder types!! So cant really say online peeps are bad or offline ones are the best – guess its how you come across to them and they to you.

      I would love to meet you too namy – what city are you in?

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  9. I remember Orkut & Yahoo chat rooms, That was fun & weird too at times (many times rather) was hooked to it during my all alone Melbourne days. But yes the friends we make online, some stick to you for life and turn into family/sisterhood… I am fortunate to have some in my life too. Lovely post Shalini, thank you Aks, for featuring and sharing with us.

    Like

    Reply

  10. Thanks Dipika – I agree the folks wh stick with you are the best! I love my sisterhood of friends around me and am blessed to have them in my life. Glad you liked the post D!! 🙂

    Like

    Reply

Leave a comment