Advice please? (1 Viewer)

[kwontas435]

Hello!

I'm currently a first year student at ANU about to study Law and Politics, Philosophy and Economics (PPE). I'm an interstate student from Sydney, but was unable to afford accommodation at ANU, so I had to vie to live at with a host family (and its quite far away from ANU as well - about an hour away by bus).

So far, making friends at O-Week has been a bit tough due to how cliquey Canberra and ANU in general can be. Townies all hang out with their high school friends, and the halls are quite insular with their friendships. I'm wondering whether or not someone can share with me any similar experiences they had, and what your outcomes were?

Thank you!

 

[Su_Ramen]

I hope you managed to make friends since there's a time lag of 8 months between our posts.
Here are some tips for making friends in Canberra.
I lived at home so it was very difficult for me to make friends. Most people seem to make friends who live in the same uni accommodation.

(1) Attend a language course
The surest way to make friends is to take a language course if you have some elective free.
Most of my friends from the ANU come from my Japanese class.
They're still the strongest connection I have from the ANU.
Language classes are easy too so it can boost your GPA.

(2) Attend Meetup events
I have never done this in Canberra but it worked for me when I was in Japan without anyone I know.
There're lots of hiking events if you like hiking.

(3) Join some circles/societies
The only society I joined was 180 Degree Consulting.
It was a group project so I met some people there.
I don't know about other societies though.

(4) Take some extracurricular courses (like Aikido)
This is a bit of a hit and miss. I did Aikido and made some new friends.
I also did Yoga but made no friends at all.