If we were having coffee, I’d welcome you to another round of coffee catch-up here on my blog. There has been so much happening in my life these days, and I’m sure a lot is happening in your life too!
If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that last weekend, I was at Vadodara for work and met a dear blogging buddy, Vinodini Iyer. You know, the switch from the virtual world to the real world was so smooth for us. We met at That Place and we were so comfortable talking as though we had known each other for years, which we actually did!!
If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that I have met quite a few blogging buddies. I have met Vinita Apte, Tulika Singh, Sulekha Rawat, Shalini Baisiwala, Nibha Gupta, Rekha Dhayani, Kajal Kapur in their respective cities, Swathi Ram and Chiky Kadambari at Jaipur and have even met Scorpria in Kuwait. I have met Shailaja V, Vidya Sury, Sid Balachandran, Roshan Radhakrishnan, UK, Vinita Bahl, Ritu Lalit, Seema Rao, Maitreni Mishra, Rahul Prabhakar, Meenakshi J Iyer, Sonal Mathur, Pawan Soni, Arvind Passey and many more during the various Blogger Meets.
If we were having coffee, I’d share with you that it is always exciting to cross the border from virtual to real world. There is a bit of apprehension and a lot of anticipation. The thing that plays on your mind is that will their style of communication and personality, match with the one that shines through the words on their blog?
If we were having coffee, you would like to know my experience of meeting bloggers in real life, right? Well, it has always been like meeting old friends. I would say that the virtual blogging buddies are friends for two reasons. (1) Because they are lovely people and that is why we connected in the virtual world and (2) because we share the same passion of blogging. On our blogs we share our deepest and truest self, which we may not be the case with most of the people around us in real life. Since we have been reading each other for long, we are able to relate with each other and that connects us more strongly.
If we were having coffee, I’d ask you if you have met any virtual friends and how was your experience?
If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that last week I have had two separate incidents where my real life ‘friends’ acted like ravenous wolves in sheep’s clothing. And that they have been acting nastily on and off has truly saddened and disheartened me. All this while, I tried to brush their bad behavior under the carpet, but now, I believe I need to let go of such toxic relationships for my peace of mind. Easier said than done, I really need to do that!
If we were having coffee, what would you talk about? Please share a snippet of your day/life with me below in the comments!
If we were having coffee, I’d thank you for joining me here today and hope we meet soon again. Until then…
24 Responses
I met Sid, Jaibala, Kala and Nibha, and each one came across as a warm and loving friend, just like they have been online! I must say we are lucky if we vibe with our online friends as well in the real world as we do in the virtual world!
I would so love to meet some more of my virtual friends, you included, of course! Just wondering when our stars will be in perfect alignment and when will come the day when we finally meet!
We haven’t met Shilpa 🙁 Come to Bangalore.
I agree that meeting blogging buddies is smooth and I’m friends with a few. Even when we are different there are things that tie us.good to know you had a lovely time.
We are yet to meet. Only blogger friend I have met outside virtual world is Bhavya and we were talking as if we know for years and was doing that one-to-one conversation for years. I love how we can connect with our blogger friends just like that in the real world too. Hoping to meet you somewhere in the near future. 🙂
If we had coffee today, I would tell you that today was election day, and also the 100th anniversary of women’s sufferage in my native New York State. I honor those who fought for the right I exercised so easily today.
I’ve met just two or three bloggers over a decade of blogging. And among those, you’re the only one I knew really well (through blogging) before we met. You’re right about one thing – the meeting is absolutely seamless. We share so much of ourselves on our blogs, specially I do, that when we meet, it seems like we have known each other for years.
I have met 6 bloggers in person so far. Met 5 of them in the San Francisco Bay Area and 1 in Chennai. We (my wife and I) should have met you in Jaipur. But for some reasons, I thought you live in Gurgaon. So missed the opportunity.
Can you please identify these two beautiful people in that photo? Thanks.
The lady in black is Vinodini and the other one is me 🙂
Sigh… I haven’t met any. I hope someday I get to have a cup of coffee with you and listen to you live.
Get rid of those ‘friends’. Life is too short for such negativity.
I have met bloggers only from the TBC in Mumbai. Not met any twitter friends too. Though I hope it will change in the future.
So nice for you Shilpa, I am in Chhattisgarh, and seldom get a chance to meet anyone. I have never met anyone till now. In fact from all the years of blogging, it was just one year ago that I met many bloggers online. So I think not meeting them personally within one year of virtually knowing them is justified. I am glad to know so many of you at least virtually
It was such a pleasure to meet you, Shilpa! You’re right, it didn’t feel at all as though we were meeting for the first time in person. The comfort level was such that it seemed as though we’d known each other for years, not only in virtual world but also in real life.
I’ve met only one blogger buddy before this who I’d known through blogosphere and that is Elly Stornebrink. I met her in Vancouver recently. We had been Skyping regularly for 3 years but had never imagined that we would ever meet. She actually proved to be an emotional anchor to me during my vunerable times when I was about to leave my son behind in a new country. Who would have known that blogging buddies could actually come to your help in real life instances like these? Besides her I’ve met Gayathri Aptekar, Heena Dhedi Shah, Aditi Sawant, Karishma Lakdawala, Meghna Hassan and Nandini Dekha during a bloggers meet. However, I had never known them even in virtual world before I met them in person. You seem to have met so many bloggers. I’d like to meet a lot of them too.
I look forward to meeting you again soon, next time over cups of some awesome Coffee and yummy food! 😉
And we narrowly missed meeting. I’ve met so many bloggers over the years and it has been a wonderful experience. It is always exciting when a relationship moves from virtual to real.
how nice to read your post shilpa and what a beautiful experience to meet persons and interact with them, so far I have not met any bloggers but I would love to meet you shilpa, its a pleasure getting to know you through your writings. If I was having coffee with you today I would tell you how happy I am to attend a Pre Convention at Coimbatore for women with a theme”Women against Violence” and the reason is that I got to meet so many other women, and felt great to be on the panel and discussions with regard to sharing my expereinces of working with women and what women can do stop domestic violence, came back refreshed and just got into the routine… good that you moved away from the toxic relationships, its not worth and it will only drain your energy. Thank you for sharing:)
Happy to know about your blogger meets. Hoping to meet you sooner. I love your coffee series.
How lovely! I’ve never met any online friends in real life – I think I’d be very nervous to do so. Where I can talk quite fluently over the keyboard, in person I’m far more awkward and self conscious. I often think that the distance of the online world is what allows me to be more myself. Still – never say never… 😉
Making that transition from online to offline is such a special one isn’t it, Shilpa? I remember when we first met – it didn’t feel like we’d met for the very first time them. Blogging is such a community inspired process and always a pleasure to have met quite a few fellow ones.
I really enjoyed reading this one, Shilpa, and am glad you got to meet some of your blog buddies. Hope you get to meet more of them. 🙂
O wow…..
I am glad that I met you at the Indiblogger workshop, ma’am.The hectic sessions made it impossible to talk to each other much :/
Let us meet again over a cup of coffee, indulge in interesting gupshup, thoughts on books and savour your home-made cakes :p
There was a time when I could claim that all but three of my Facebook/blogging friends were known to me in real, face-to-face life. Now I have many more—you are one of them!—I’d love to meet if my travels are able to take me there. My best friend is someone I started working with when I edited her first novel, and we met in person two years later. Though we’ve only gotten to spend time together twice in four years, we talk every day and are planning our next get-together.
I’m sorry you’ve dealt with toxic “friends” this week. It’s hard to cut off completely but you’ll be so much healthier for it.
I’m sorry to hear about the toxic friendships in your life, but was happy to hear about you meeting blogging friends in person. I love that experience! I have met a few fellow bloggers in person, and you’re right! There is so much in common right off the bat. 🙂
It is such a pleasure to read your coffee posts. I am so glad you had met so many blogging buddies over the years. I love to do so. I haven’t met any of them till now. If you plan a trip to Chennai do let me know. I know your liking for South Indian food and I will be very glad to prepare something for you!! Otherwise, I would love to meet blogging people soon. I was in Bangalore for almost a year on work, but sigh I wasn’t into any social networks then. Now, I feel I missed an awesome year there. Maybe, someday we will!
I would love to meet you in real life. Have any trips planned to the US? Come and have coffee with me.
Virtual friends can turn into real life friends, as I’ve found. A whole lot of my friends online have gone on to matter as much as real ones.