ah207

This question may have been asked before in the forum - or perhaps the information is spread over many threads. Maybe collecting your experiences in one thread may help.

Not talking about family here - just friends.

Here's the question: When you returned to the UK after several years abroad (5 plus years), did you find that the friends you were close to before you went abroad (and desperately looking to get back with) were now somehow....not quite the same as you remembered them ? That something seems to be missing - you can't get that same chummy-ness, that same spark even though you try hard to talk about old times, adventures together, house-shares, sports teams you both played for....it just doesn't quite seem to gel back in same way

Or perhaps you had friends with whom you hit it off all over again - as if you had never been apart ??

Any thoughts/experiences ?

scot47

People move on. I know a few people that i first met in my student days, 50 or more years ago. Not many though and none of these are close friends.
Part of the price of moving about. I look at some people who are still in the same place where they went to school and I think...."WTF ?"

Tirytory

Not the same as it was just a visit home but even after two years there was a nearly imperceptible difference. I've changed, I just didn't gel as well as I used too. It was bound to happen..

not2old

Canada has changed you, or without the rose coloured glasses, the UK has shown its real colours to you?

Stinkypup

To me it is no longer home, you are right N2O, your perception changes, more and more as time goes by- I suppose it depends on how often you revisit. We haven't been back to North Norfolk which we left to come to Canada so so see friends when we return, we maintain contacts electronically, Skype etc . They can and will come and stay if they can/ wish. When we go back, typically yearly it is to visit family who live remote from where we lived- that is all time permits. That doesn't help the OP- I'm sorry but just wanted to comment. I find we look forward to our trips but look forward to coming home to Canada.

michali

Interesting comments! I have not resurrected old friendships as much as I should have. I do feel a bit different having lived abroad for nearly 45 years with just two brief years back here in the late 1990’s. But my children are here and that is why we came back and we have enjoyed our return immensely. We live in London and we love it! My husband is on a visa so we are doing everything we can to ensure he is granted a renewal. To have to leave would be devastating from many aspects.

spouse of scouse

.....and some of them might look at you and think....."WTF?"

scot47

I am sure they think I am a degenerate and rootless cosmopolitan, Not only did I leave small-town Scotland to study in Edinburgh, but I then spent 40 years working in "foreign parts" !

spouse of scouse

That's it then, all credibility lost!

Editha

I think it is a mistake to think that anything will be the same, whether it is people or places or anything else. Everything changes all the time. I'm not exactly the same person who went to Canada in '06, so why should I expect any of my friends to have stood still?

I also have different needs of my friends in my early sixties, from those of my early fifties and they have different needs of me.

Novocastrian

Nor have we, but (aside of course from family) we've kept in touch with and mutually visited a core of semi-lirelong friends from the Uk (mostly student days) abut also Germany from when we lived there and from France.

I doubt there's much point in digging up former friends with whom you've not kept in close contact one way or another.

ah207

been interesting reading everyone's thoughts. Agreed - with each passing year - especially when 5 to 10 years have passed, we change as well as our friends. People start families, children, other important concerns/committments - so it does seem s a bit meaningless to be talking to an old friend about a superb catch that someone held in the slips, or a great goal someone scaored just because you and your friend once played for the same village sports team three decades a go.

With family (at least in my case) its been different. I too have had nieces/nephews being born, grown up, gone to University - but every time I get back with my brother, its pretty much like always. But with friends its been different. There have even been times when I've thought why am I the only one always sending the e-mail, or asking how's things - surely if my friend cared, he/she would occasionally drop me a line - especially nowadays with social media. It takes two to tango...and I have noticed several close friendships just slipping away...for no particular reason.

I often wonder what it would have been like to have grown up, gone to school, lived and worked in the same area. People from my dad's generation worked in the same factory for 50 years - and only ever lived in one house, with the same neighbours, and same friends who grew old with them. Sometimes, they all came up from the same school!! Part of me envies that lifestyle.

I haven't moved back to the UK yet - but I'm coming up to the 9 year mark of having been away. I would like to move back eventually - but my recent short visits have shown that friends have moved on...and it won't be the same as just slotting straight back in.

Victor Meldrew

I have been overseas for 14 years and have tried to maintain contact both with family and friends during this period to varying degrees. I have just returned last July to UK and building up contacts/reconnecting with old friends/making new friends. To answer the OP question, I would say

1. You have to have an open mind to all possibilities as there will be different responses from different people.
2. Some friends have not bothered reciprocating the contact I have tried to make.
3. Some friends, who I have known for 30 years+ - it has been just like I have never been away; we have picked up where we left off.
4. Some old school friends who I haven't met for 30+ years, it is quite obvious that we are different animals - they have stayed in their home town and have become very parochial in the values and experiences. The experiences living overseas have made me a different person than I was before I left.
5. There is 1 old school friend from 30+ years ago who has maintained regular contact and because of this, the friendship has carried on positively.

I would suggest you don't bust a gut trying to reconnect - offer the 'invite'. Those who are genuinely interested in maintaining the friendship will make it quite obvious, as will those who don't.

It's a funny old world!

Novocastrian

Perhaps, but a more interesting part of you thought, all those years back, that that shit wasn't good enough. And then you did something about it.

Celebrate your self resolve, you did something they didn't have the balls for.

Victor Meldrew

I guess to a certain extent it boils down to motivation and choice. There are probably many people who stay near home because that is what they want to do - they enjoy the comfort of familiarity and, for them, experiencing new countries and cultures doesn't figure into their plans.

On the other hand, as NVC suggests, there may well be some who would have loved to explore a little further but either circumstance or fate did not permit.

The comment about previous generations staying put (same job, same town, same house, same town) probably reflects the times - it was less easy to travel, to find overseas jobs (no internet then!) and to uproot. There were a couple of initiatives in the 60's - £10 Poms and similar for South Africa, but on the whole it wasn't so easy to go out and explore and risks were higher.

Celebrate your life choices as well as other people's.