attend a Meetup

Last Thursday I was in the park downtown sitting on a bench near someone with a beautiful voice strumming on his guitar singing passionately. There was barely any sun seeping thru in this early part of the evening. I had gone there to memorize some lines but then felt in the mood to write about my current events. I was there for an hour when I got a text message on my phone. It was a classmate from my French class texting me from a meetup at place in the eastvillage, but I was content in my spot at the park and not that interested in going. A few minutes later another mate called me insisting that I stop by. So I ended up going . I must admit this time it was quite enjoyable. I wasn’t there long but it made me decide to go to the Monday one that was happening at a restaurant that I like in the lower eastside. So yesterday I went. The atmosphere was lovely and there was a great mix of francophiles to converse with. Glad I gave it another shot b/c it does help me in my application of the language, with my “creative” grammar and all;)

so i joined a group online and two weeks later, lastnite in fact, attended my first meet-up. it was in a dark lowly lit basement area of the pub with one big screen that had a football match playing on it. when i first got there the place was rather empty. a few people scattered around whose eyes i could feel fall suspiciously upon me. i scanned the room to see signs of my two classmates that had confirmed with me, would be in attendance, for this french language meet-up. at no sight of them and feeling a little vulnerable i started dialing. then i spied one familiar face and rushed over before giving the person at the bar hawking in my direction a chance for any type of interrogation. so began the start of the meet and greet and chit-chatting…in french…or as much french as we knew to chit-chat in. a few minutes in, the second of the two classmates arrived and one by one others from the group rolled on in. there were many there that were at this meet-up for the first time and then the “regulars”. i must be completely honest however, i did find… well i don’t like to say this but some folks were just a bit “off” and not in the way i find to be curious either, almost creepy at times perhaps evan personally aggressive. at one point i felt trapped in a circle being bombarded by a rapid fire of questions shooting my way. i think got dizzy. as soon as i was able to duck away i headed toward my friend and we just stared at each other across the way, sensing synchronisity in eachothers internal monologue, we just could not stop with our outbursts of laughter toward the situation we were surrounded by. i probably won’t be going back to this meet-up any time soon but am open to try other groups later…maybe a knitting group…who knows. i still think its worth a try for those who haven’t done it. it was quite hilarious really.