Why did I have so few deep friendships back home?
This was a jolting realization I had at my favorite cafe after finishing one of my last semesters of college in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Sipping my favorite 'Obsidian' pour over coffee, I was planning my summer break back home to Singapore by scrolling through the list of Facebook friends I wanted to reconnect with. It was a short break, so i needed to be strategic, choosing only friendships that had clear substance. After all, after spending 18 years in one place, I probably have way too large of a community to meet everyone I wanted to right?
So I scrolled and scrolled through my list of 1,105 friend connections on facebook, and then it hit me - the people I truly wanted to catch up with amounted only to 2 friend groups, and about 6 individuals. That's it? Surely after 18 years at once place there would be more life-giving friendships than that! Why was this?
As I pondered this, I realized that my life in Singapore was full of exciting, fun times - I played basketball, laughed a lot with acquaintances, was involved in many activities, but in the end, there was little room for practicing slow presence. The accelerometer of life constantly moved me forward to the next meeting, the next task, the next job, the next project. On one hand, as a collective society we needed this to survive (we make up our lack of natural resources with a productive workforce). On the other hand, it bled into my social life.
When my friends did gather, there was an undercurrent of haste that seemed to pace the interaction. Whether it be at a shopping mall watching people hustle from store to store, or over a meal at a chaotic local hawker center (outdoor food center), our hangouts were typically time-bound, which subtly pressured us to pack as much into that 1.5 hour window as possible.
Where were the pockets of slowness that I had grown fond of in the US, where we would sit around a bonfire with a cup of cocoa, or gather in a friend's home to cook together and talk the night away, or go on a cool morning stroll around a still, tranquil lake? As a wise friend put it, where were the moments where there was no pressure to 'do', but just space to 'be'?
I've grown to love these slow moments, away from the deafening undertone of construction drills, un-pressured to keep pace with the chasmic walking gaits I've learned we have as Singaporeans. Don't get me wrong, there's a ton I love about Singapore, it's one of my favorite places, full of the people I love most, and i'm a city boy at heart. But in Singapore we have to work much harder to find these quiet moments of stillness in the city.