Cross border friendships

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There was a time when having friends meant the kids who stayed in your neighbourhood. But as the world of opportunities and technology expands — so is the circle of our friendships. Teens today maintain close friendships with people living not just in their own cities, but across continents as well. Like everything else in the 21st century, friendships too are going global.
Take the case of 18-year-old Sukanya K.C. When her closest friend moved to California during Class 8, maintaining their friendship was initially difficult. She says, “I wasn’t as active online and we had to rely on the occasional phone call to get up-to-date. But over the past two years, with Facebook, I get constant updates on what she’s up to, whether it’s her prom or the fact that she got her yearbook photo taken.”
After graduation, several of 20-year-old Jatin Kanal’s friends travelled abroad to pursue higher education. With a friend circle that covers major cities in the UK and the US, he says he is assured of a bed wherever he decides to visit. “Tools like Skype and Gchat really help in staying in touch with all my childhood friends who moved away. I recently went and stayed with one of my friends in his apartment just outside London,” he says.
While it seems to be the norm to have friends in the US, Arjun Iyer has a close friend in Japan. Arjun says, “Varun lives in Tokyo and I’ve known him since school. Social networking has come to our rescue in a big way. We sometimes call each other too.”
But while the Internet has made global friendships easier than pie, there are others who maintain friendships the old fashioned way. “I write regularly to my friend Sneha, a student in Sheffield, and another friend Felicity, who is in Germany. I know email is so much easier, but I just find sending letters very satisfying,” says Malini N.
For today’s teens, where there is a friend, there is a way.