Today’s topic will be on friendship and the type of friends. I’ve been thinking about this since June, when everybody went into fifth gear, chew notes ad infinitum and prepare for the upcoming exams. I finally got my conclusion around October during the breaks. Basically, in my opinion there are 4 main types of friends, normal, false, girl and best friend.

This is the definition given by wiki about friendship.

Friendship is a term used to denote co-operative and supportive behavior between two or more beings. In this sense, the term connotes a relationship which involves mutual knowledge, esteem, and affection and respect along with a degree of rendering service to friends in times of need or crisis.

I did not read further as I believe that it will some how distort my thinking. I just want to pen down what I think at this point of time, I will probably look at it after I have finished this post to get a clearer picture of what the experts got to say.

I shall start with the category that I term as normal friends. In fact, I would put more than 90% of people I term as friends into this category. Basically, I know their name and something about them. They are my ex-classmates, my current classmates, the people I knew on exchange programmes, etc…. When I meet these people on the road, I will wave and say hello. I always have a feeling that these are the people whom I get to know well but the strength of the friendship bond is weak, so that when I move on to the next stage of my life, they would probably be history and have little impact on our lives. Yet, when we meet, we always have some common topic to talk about, rejoice and reminisce about the past, how in the short span of our lives, so many incidents have occurred. Normally, we will muck-rack about other friends, soccer and yes girls (and guys if the other is a girl). However, I would not entrust any of my secrets to this group of friends as their loyalty and ultimate motive may be unclear at that moment.

Time is an important factor when dealing with friends. If the length of separation is long, I always find it better to each others advantage to be slightly more reserved. Also, because of my (and probably many others) foolish pride, I would sometime refuse to acknowledge an old friend of mine, just in case he/she has forgotten about me. It’s cooler to ignore a person than to say hello and end up with the other person asking “who are you”.

Probably the most eminent people in this group is my sec 3and 4 classmates. Many of whom I have really a wonderful friendship with. For example Shi Wei and me blowing Milo powder onto each others face and the surrounding friends laughing at our stupidity, Yu Guang and me having a (I find it hard to come up with an adjective for this word, probably joyous, since it was filled with laughter) fight involving Chia Jone’s belt and Wei Hongs racket at 2 in the morning in the Hwa Chong Dormitory.

Also in this category are probably my exchange mates, like Tadaaki, Shiota, and many more. Our shoulders brush each other without leaving anything but pleasant memories and we just return to our normal lives in this long marathon of life. It always saddens me when after an exchange programme, we often lose contact despite the fact that we promised to keep in touch. In fact since once in 2005, twice last year, I have given up asking for contact information. It is fruitless and pointless, since we are not going to talk to each other even if the other side is online in msn.

From this ~90% of normal friends, a few will stand out and I term it as best friends. They will have a deep-lasting impact on our lives, theirs intertwined with mine. It has to withstand the crucible of time and often unforeseen circumstances. They are the people whom I will ask for help if im in trouble without having to worry about quid pro quo. The majority of the people will probably have one or two such friends. Because of the stringent criteria I have attached to this category, I am unable to come up with any names though I do have a few possible candidates.

The next type of friends is what I call fake friends. On the surface, I will smile, say hello and strike a conversion attempting to be Mr Nice Guy, but underneath I cannot wait to gnaw at their skulls and kick their viscera. I myself feel that it is down right hypocrisy, but sometimes in life, we will meet people whom we despise and treat beneath contempt. If I lash out at every single one of these people, it will not only make me a person deemed as having low EQ, but also expose myself to their watchful eye. As I do not know when I will require their assistance, it is tactful to remain on good terms with these people, especially if some of them are you superiors. I wouldn’t want my talents to go to waste just because of interpersonal relationships.

For me, I try to keep minimal contact with this group of people, as time will expose the true self, the lesser time available the lesser chance I will be exposed. I believe that they share the same sentiments about me, just that we do not want to openly engage each other and waste precious time and energy.

Luckily for me, I have few despicable people whom I must have to deal nicely. I got this idea from TV rather than personal experience, I realized that unknowingly I am being hypocritical at times. Alas can’t help it. Probably I will meet more of this type of people in life during work, where competition to move up the corporate ladder is much tougher. But now, I am satisfied with the status quo. The people I despise are mainly those who create trouble without reason and lazy people. People who create trouble may probably fail and end up in god-knows-where while those who are lazy can’t make it to my school. Either way they cannot make it into my social circle. Ha-ha

So im left with girlfriend. I leave it to the last because unlike others types of friends, its special in terms of the way the two parties deal with each other. You can only have one at a time and probably better not to have too many throughout a single lifespan! It paves the stage for marriage life with all its vows and other problems. You can also hug, kiss and do much more things with your partner, there is more body contact and fun! (probably some of you have already realized that I changed from 1^st to 3^rd person, ha-ha that’s because I don’t have one yet, my experience is based on the people around me. but im working hard to get one although I acknowledge that it is an uphill task). I shall not talk about this category much since im a novice in such a matter and you would probably have more experience than me.

Well, to end, I just have to say that it is really important to keep in touch with each other. Don’t feel that it is against our pride to start a conversation. On top of that, one has to treat his friend with whole-heartedness. Friendship is based on mutual trust and the enjoyment of each others company. I sincerely believe that to have a strong friendship, trying to take advantage of the other side will end up in ultimate failure, it’s about giving not taking. (Ha-ha, try to understand the last line through personal experiences if you have not already done so, because I have difficulty putting my idea across)