Meeting New People Abroad

I made my first British friend today!
It's not just someone I met once and I stalked on Facebook for a month, or made light conversation with and now believe we're BFFs. It's a friend I met in September, and we've been hanging out for a while - but I feel like we've now reached 'good friend' status! This is a huge accomplishment for me, since I feel like making friends as an adult is nearly as difficult as it was when I was in 3rd grade and wore braces and snowpants all year 'round.


It's made even more difficult for me because I wore as a freelancer now. Office friends are pretty great because you automatically have one thing in common: hating your boss. However, I don't have that auto-groundwork with anyone. So, I needed new ways to meet people while living abroad.
The first thing I did was enroll in a short class. Luckily, there are plenty of venues in Nottingham which offer them and I found one to suit my interests: Creative Writing. It was a class of about 25 students, all with similar interests, but from completely different walks of life. Everyone was very friendly, talented and willing to share their ideas. In addition to learning new and creative formats and Creative Writing techniques, I got to interact with people like me. It only last four weeks, but I met one really good friend and joined a group that meets up every month to discuss their ongoing writing projects. Very well worth it.
Another great way to meet people resulted from staying in a hostel in Dublin. I was wary about it, but I figured it would be a good way to connect with other young people while travelling alone - and it was the most affordable accommodation I could find in the city.
I was more than happy to stay in my room, finishing up my writing assignments - but being on the top floor meant that I couldn't connect to the internet. So, I had to enter the unknown domain of the Common Area. Several people from across Europe were hanging out and I managed to join in on a conversation and was invited out to a mini pub crawl. Everyone was super friendly and really excited about keeping in touch. I made a few really good friends with whom I speak to regularly.
So, that's all I got for now. When I discover some more friend-making tactics, I'll let you know!