I used to be lonely sometimes, or didn't have quite as many friends as I'd wish. Then I joined a free friendship/dating site about 15 years ago, and made friend

I used to be lonely sometimes, or didn't have quite as many friends as I'd wish. Then I joined a free friendship/dating site about 15 years ago, and made friends in a lot of countries. I had to learn spanish because I started making friends with latinas, and really loved that, and most don't speak any english. So, that added a lot of countries to the potential-friends pool. (I'd love to get good at French and Portuguese, to add Brazil and French-speaking Africa.) Ever since, I've had a load of great friends all over the world. It's been amazing! Right now my dearest friends are in Bulgaria, Ghana, India, Philippines, Peru, Colombia, etc. The main surprise has been, how little cultural gap/barrier there is - none really, except language, if you don't speak it. Now my main problem is - how on earth am I ever gonna be able to visit them all! Also, during the years I joined 2 free language learning sites, the ones where you meet someone and teach each other. I was only on them for a week or two before meeting 'teachers' who quickly became dear friends, one in Nicaragua, the second in Spain. That's also a great way to meet people. And a great way to learn a language. (I studied grammar a lot in the early days too, of course.)