How To Make Friends While Traveling/Living Abroad.
Making friends while traveling is not only easy but extremely rewarding. Cultural differences may seem like barriers but in actuality they are a good starting point for conversation. During my travels, when I've met people from other countries, I end up learning about the place they are from too which is like traveling in two places at once.
For example, while in Singapore, I took day trips with people from Australia and Israel. In South Africa, I was with Germans, a Mauritinian, Spaniard, Japanese...you get the point. So HOW exactly do you meet new people...
Join special interests groups on Social Media
People have a love/hate relationship with social media. I'm here to say you can both hate and love social media and still make friends! Whether you join a social media platform as your real or alter-ego self, you can still join and interact with groups where the result is meeting people in real life. Here are some platforms where I have met some fantastic people:
Bumble
Bumble is known as a dating app however many don't know that there is a feature called: Bumble BFF where you can create a profile only for making platonic friends. With this profile both parties can write to each other after they've matched. My friend making strategy would be to set up a museum visit or coffee meet up right away and if the vibes were right, we'd meet again. I have several good friends now that I met, on Bumble BFF, while living in Barcelona.
Meetup.com
On this site, you can enter your location and the hobby, sport or subject you are interested in to see if there is a group having a meetup/event for it. When I was a student in New York, I ran two Meetup.com groups. I organized events for adults like Disco Roller Rink Skating and an evening of Arcade Games & Dinner. This group was for adults who wanted to do something beyond going out for drinks and we always had a blast! My other Meetup group was for people studying fo the GMAT.
Facebook groups
Anytime I would move to a new place, I'd join the local expat fb group and from there I'd learn about other special interest groups in the area. For example, I joined a house plant exchange group in Milan. As you know, collecting houseplants became a thing during the height of the pandemic so this group was thousands large and active!
I also joined an International Women's Group and within this group other women created subgroups like Women in Entrepreneurship, Art Lovers, Saturday Morning Meditation, Plein Air Painting, etc. In the latter group, we would take the train from Milano Centrale and go to draw and have lunch in places like Lake Como.
Besides the usual questions about the local area, occasionally, people will post on the expat groups that they are looking to meet new people and suggest meeting somewhere. You can either join them or be encouraged to make a post like that yourself and see who joins you!
Take a Class/Workshop/Course
Enrolling in a course to learn something that you are interested in is already a great idea; now all you have to do is take a small step further and make connection with your fellow classmates. Depending on the length of the course, this could be more or less difficult. You will have more opportunity to get to know classmates in a 1-week course than a 1-day one however, if you're short on time and have the confidence, try introducing yourself to your classmates and suggest to meet up outside of the class for lunch, dinner or perhaps sightseeing. If they in the same course as you, chances are that they are a person open to new experiences and people and will agree to meet.
I've met some amazing people while taking various courses around the World. What makes this type of meeting special is; a learning setting is exciting because everyone there is looking forward to the lesson(s), most people have shared interests, classes are usually full of fun activities, you make mistakes together and also help each other with challenges. All of these small experiences combined build the foundation of a good friendship.
If you are more of a person who wants to meet people individually, the Bumble BFF option is the best of the above options. You could also be one of those people that have no problem with going to a lounge or bar to sit alone. That is another place to easily start a conversation with a stranger.
The above are just a few ideas on where to find people to make friends with while traveling or living abroad. I hope you feel encouraged. Good luck and have fun!