Most of my friends are from Europe

Post Reply New Topic

For some reason I keep trying to make friends with people of European descent (I'm Australian, and both my parents were born there). This is probably because most of the actual friends I have are of European descent (usually Italian or Russian).

As a result I keep trying to hang with Italian/Croatian/Macedonian/Russian/Greek people (there is a huge Italian, Croatian and Greek expat population in Perth). Generally I've been well received, but I'm often forgotten by these people. Is is because I'm not an ethnic (for the record, I look like I'm Irish), because I don't have a history with these people, or because socially I am about as useful as an Atari?

In my history of friendships, most have been foreign or from an insular ethnic group. I think perhaps we're drawn to them because they are outsiders in a way, like us. As to how to keep them as friends, I obviously have no idea, since I can't either.

The mentioned cultures all seem to have a family oriented structure, with a lot of habits etc. I can imagine it is difficult to get on a level of trust to be accepted fully.

I think this is common. My best friend is from Russia. I managed to keep her because we would bond over the perplexity of the strange culture we found ourselves in. Many of the inexplicable things NTs do are related to the culture they happen to be living in, such as fashion, gender roles, and music. We found ourselves asking the same questions and speculating about possible answers. I could never fit in with a group of Europeans because they tend to ostracize anyone that has different heritage, but I do relate to them one-to-one.