How can an introvert Asian engineer like me make friends?

I think you look at it from the wrong perspective, it's not about voluntary work per se, it's about caring about other people. If you dismiss people because of your stereotypes, you'll never get to know them.

If you're open and generous, sure, some people might abuse this, but do you want to be friends with such people?

If you want to get to know people and become their friends you will eventually have to care about them in one way or in another. Man, you can even be of opposite opinion, that disagreement could actually be the foundation for a future relationship. Who knows?

So in my opinion, being open, generous and getting rid of your stereotypes and bigotry when it comes to other people is a great way for making friends.

Full Text:

(I had to use Google Docs because my text exceeded 2000 characters. I apologize.)

I know the question sounds really awkward, but it's just exactly what I think.

I am a software engineer intern at a mid-sized company in redwood city, and my internship ends on August.

I love my work, and I consider myself a reasonably intelligent, tidy, and nice guy.

However, it saddens me when I find myself idling alone on weekends, doing everything by myself.

Since I started my internship on February, on weekends, I have always had meals, watched movies, gone shopping, taken a walk, and done every activity by myself. I do not even have roommates.

This is fine most of the time, but it's really painful on times when I have a lack of self-confidence. I think it may even become dangerous later.

Whenever I see groups of people in the street hanging out with each other, a sense of envy grows in my mind. I wonder where they met each other, and how come they became so intimate to each other.

As a man at age 26, I want to meet some nice ladies too.

My major problems, as I think, are:

1. After 3.5 years of college life in which I had absolutely no social life, my introversion seriously exacerbated. I have an especially hard time getting close to strangers.

2. I thought my English was decent, but I found out that is only true when compared to other asian students' in colleges FOB, and these days I am more and more realizing that my English is not good enough to become close friends with English speaking people. Every day I meet people in my work, and I manage to express what I want to say, but often it's in a very awkward way, and even worse, when I am among many people talking, I can never take part in their conversation. (believe me, I literally suck without enough time and a dictionary)

3. I do not have a car, and for many people in the bay area it's okay, but for me it's a great hindrance to being social. Think about it, what girl would consider seeing an awkward guy even without a car!

What can I do? I imagined myself striking up a conversation with people sitting near at a cafe, standing at a queue, etc., but since I know I will not be able to talk like a normal American guy (not even close, when it comes to a small chat), I recoil.

I started fearing coming of weekends. To me it's just two and a half utterly lonely days that could have been spent in a more constructive way but repeatedly ends up being wasted and growing the self-hatred towards me.

This isn't about general voluntary work. Never.

This is about you helping strangers, or friends of friends. Moving, cooking dinner, helping with a legal problem, helping them with their exams, letting them borrow your rice cooker over the weekend, helping them with their birthday party, inviting them for a drink, volunteering to look after their dog and so on.

I think that's tricky. If you help people too much, then they resent you because of the built up debt (which is why I wrote the part about debt in there). It's counterintuitive, but I think asking for help is a better strategy for making friends than offering help.

You will have to do things that scare you and goes against your destructive instincts. This is life, this is growing. It's an excuse that it commes easier for some, a truer and more productive observation is that it's mainly practice and you've neglected practicing. Don't victimize yourself or find excuses (what girl would date someone without a car..). Some others suggested arenas for you to get started so wont repeat that. Some good reads: The Diceman (habit breaking), you can also google rejection therapy (removing fear of "losing"). Good luck, stay brave.