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Terrible advice for making college friends involves cold shoulders, weird stockpiles

Casey Baseel May 17, 2014
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Academically speaking, most Japanese students don’t have that much trouble with the transition from high school to college. University entrance exams are notoriously difficult, and compared to the diligent studying they had to do to get into college in the first place, most find their educational workload, especially as freshemen, to be pretty easy to handle.

Making friends, though, can be tough. Rural Japan isn’t peppered with college towns in the same way some other countries are, and many students have no choice but to move far away from home to one of the nation’s big cities to pursue higher education. And while many students abroad can look forward to meeting new people in their dorm, very few Japanese universities provide any kind of student housing. Even in the rare case that they do, having a roommate is unheard of.

So it’s no surprise that many students are keen to pick up pointers on how to make interpersonal connections in their new surroundings. Unfortunately, not all advice is good advice, as one Japanese freshman recently found out.

Being about a month into the new school year, Twitter user Aya Tobi apparently felt he’d spent enough time settling in, and attended a lecture on how to make friends in college. Tobi doesn’t specify whether this was an official function of the school’s faculty or one of its student groups, but he did snap a few pictures of the materials that were given out, which revealed some rather unique ideas about the nature of friendship.

First, the student tweeted this excerpt from the handout:

Throw away your high school friends

None of your college friends are going to want to listen to stories about the people you hung out with in high school. It’ll make them feel jealous, and it’s the same as cheating on your boyfriend or girlfriend.

So, erase every one of your high school friend’s contact information from your smartphone’s address book right away. Then, fill up those empty spaces with new friends you’ve met at college. Once you’re finished, take a moment to look at the setting sun and remember your friends you’ve just done away with. It’ll be like a little memorial service.

▼ “Ah, gotta delete her, yep, gotta do it. Whoops! Almost forgot to delete this person, too. I’m just so busy!”

大学にあった友達作り講座がやばい pic.twitter.com/mCy7DH2BNt

— あやとび (@Aya_tobi) May 12, 2014

Ouch. Sure, no one wants to feel like they’re your second choice to spend time with, but this seems a little harsh. Plus, what about the two times every year, New Year’s and the Obon festival in the summer, when people in Japan head back to their home towns? Are your old friends off limits then, too?

OK, so the lecture explained an easy way to get rid of old friends, but what kind of pointers does it give to help you replace them?

Carry several erasers

大学にあった友達作り講座がやばいその2 pic.twitter.com/C9Ijy1Xn9J

— あやとび (@Aya_tobi) May 12, 2014

An eraser is something every student needs. In order to lend a hand to your friends when they forget to bring one to class, you should always carry a stock of spares with you. Try to develop a reputation, so people will look at you and know, “That guy always has a lot of erasers on him.”

Eventually, the image people will have of you will evolve into, “There’s nothing his erasers can’t erase,” and girls will start asking you to help them “erase the memories of their old boyfriend,” which will lead to a stronger relationship than just the loaner and borrower of an eraser.

Wow, zero for two on friendship advice. Full marks on crafting the opening scene to a porno with a title like The Back Rows of Econ 101, though.

So what was Tobi’s take on all this?