This is a guest post by Mubin Khan who blogs regularly at http://www.mubinsmusings.blogspot.com/

How many friends do you have?

Let’s think! School friends, college friends, friends in office, friends at home, at places we frequent regularly, and then some phenomena possibly unique to Mumbai City – train friends.

Then there’s the new technology-driven revolution. Facebook, Orkut and other social networking sites, through which we now have hundreds – if not thousands – of friends!

The measure of a person’s popularity is the number of friends he has.

But just wait. Are these friends? Or are they acquaintances, colleagues, neighbours, associates etc?

The Oxford Dictionary defines the word ‘friend’ as ‘a person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations’.

I believe this simple definition is not enough! It falls far short of the real understanding of the word.

I read a nice poem (I don’t know the author) which defined friendship as follows-

A friend is a tender shoulder
On which to softly cry
A well to pour your troubles down
And raise your spirits high

A friend is a hand to pull you up
From darkness and despair…
When all your other “so called” friends
Have helped to put you there

A true friend is an ally
Who can’t be moved or bought
A voice to keep your name alive
When others have forgot

But most of all a friend has a true heart
For from the hearts of friends
There comes the greatest love of all!

And a much more profound definition of a friend was given by Aristotle, who said, “What is a friend? A single soul, dwelling in two bodies”.

I remember having read a very nice story of a businessman who had just one friend, while his son had hundreds. The son used to keep telling the businessman that he would have succeeded much more in life if he had more friends, and used to keep referring to himself and his friend circle.

Then one day, the businessman told his son, “Son, let’s check if your so-called friends are really your friends. Tomorrow morning, go to all your friends one by one and tell them that we have lost everything in our business, and we’re destitute – on the streets. Tell them that you need their help. Ask them for a place to stay and food for our entire family and some of our servants for one month. Tell them that we would manage on our own after that.”

The next morning, the son did as he was told. He went to each of those hundreds of friends and asked them for help. But under one pretext or the other, he was turned away by all of them. Each one – except for two.

He returned home and narrated the entire episode to his father. The businessman asked him about the statements of the two friends who had agreed to help him. He replied, “Dad, the first friend asked me, ‘How many people are you?’ When I gave the answer, he asked me to come on over and stay with him. The second friend said, ‘Come on over. By the way, how many of you would be there?’.”

The businessman told his son, “See, you have possibly just two friends. Nurture and cherish their friendship, especially of the second one. Because he could be possibly your only friend.”

While the son had got the message, he was still puzzled as to why his father still said that these two were ‘possibly’ his friends. So he asked his father. And the businessman said, “Now let me show you what a friend really is. Go to my friend and tell him the same story.”

The son went to his father’s friend. Upon hearing the story, the father’s friend said, “Son, you come in and rest, while I go and fetch your father and everyone else. And you need not worry about one month or whatever. You can stay here for as long as you want. And I’ll help you and your father to build your business again.”

So, how many friends do you have?