Re: Making new friends
sweetif, i'm the same way. People take offense if you don't call all the time or go to their every party and pretty soon, they stop inviting.
I think the thing is - you have to make a choice. Do you want to spend a lot of time being a social butterfly or not. If you do want friends (come in handy for rishtas, for meeting men just becuz, for playmates for your kids, for setting up friends and family for rishtas, for setting up your kids later on with rishtas), then you need to go to dawats/outings with friends.
They dont' HAVE to be dawats. They can be dinners out with friends. Make the effort - go show face, and talk to people. Then throw some invites out yourself, have people bring their friends, and expand your networks accordingly.
Target people who are already major social butterflies and you'll meet more people.
The problem is that desi girls can have attitude issues. I can't tell you how often in Miami I've gone to parties, been down to earth and friendly to people, and they just don't reciprocate. And you can tell some haven't even been taught basic manners of socializing.
Catty crap like, last time I went to a party, I really didn't know many people so I sat down at a table with girls my age and asked a girl "Is this seat taken?" and she was like "yes". Turned out she didn't know who was sitting there, and actually no one had been sitting there. They were just using the chair to store their purses.
I mean, if youre going to get cold shoulders by arrogant chamchis, then you really end up having no desire to socialize. It just takes a few bad apples.
Ok, fine this is the halai memon crowd of south florida. So maybe its different with other people. I socialize with other types of memons, and I don't see this behavior. Nor much with punjabis or the Urdu speaking either.
However, I do notice cliques and competition over who is better dressed. It is COMMON here to dress like you're going to a shaadi for a friggin birthday party in the park.
I mean it gets sickening. I will bump into a number of miami girls in Karachi spending the summer there building their wardrobe for the year. They go annually, and they get a whole wardrobe made. On average like 20 joras or more. I mean, comon. Who the heck has the time or money?
But their dads all own stores and small businesses and they can afford it. And they spend the rest of the year comparing their clothes. These dawats end up being fashion competitions. And then you try to approach a clique of girls and forget it. You're lucky if they talk to you for 5 minutes.
COMON. This is just ridiculous.
I have met normal desi people, but its mostly through the universities, and as we don't have many universities here, that crowd is pretty small. And the universities don't cross-talk, so it's not like you'll meet many people from other universities. At my uni, there were not many desis to begin with.
Meh, what can you do?
I try, and even though I try, I only have a small select group of people that I would be comfortable inviting over to hang out with me.