Social clubs helping young Canberrans form friendships in the transient city
When masters student Kinneret Pezarkar moved to Canberra from a city more than 40 times its size, she faced an overwhelming problem she never expected.
The 24-year-old, in the prime of her life, remembers sitting on a couch in her room on weekends wondering what everyone else was doing with their time.
She said finding friends was a daunting challenge in the first few months.
"It's more difficult to make friends as an adult,"Ms Pezarkar said.
"It can feel a little bit embarrassing at the start, like, 'Oh, do you want to hang out with me?'
"Sometimes there would be days where I didn't have anything planned for the weekend."
Despite being surrounded by other young adults on her university campus, Kinneret Pezarkar struggled to make friends. (ABC News: Simon Beardsell)
And moving to a place where many other young adults have also moved too did not guarantee making friends would be easy.
Despite being surrounded by other students who had left their support networks behind, Ms Pezarkar believes making friends is challenging in Canberra.
Best of friends with everyone 'a high expectation to set'
In Australia, almost one in three people experience moderate levels of loneliness, according to a 2023 report by Ending Loneliness Together.
ACT residents report the highest rate, equating to 40 per cent of residents.
Ms Pezarkar noticed people came and went from Canberra.
"I usually go in expecting to be the best of friends with everybody, and I think it's a high expectation to set," Ms Pezarkar said.
Kinneret Pezarkar started a book club with fellow university students to make new friends. (ABC News: Rose-Cherie Galea)
"It can feel kind of temporary, so either you give too much or you give too [little].
"They might leave, so why do I waste so much time?"
But after several months calculating time zone differences to keep phoning friends in Mumbai, and being gently encouraged to overcome anxiety barriers, Ms Pezarkar decided to step out and try again, to meet new people.
"You realise that you need to break out of whatever shell you're in — these labels of introvert, extravert," she said.
"You need to make the first move and do it if you really want it."
She asked people in her class if they wanted to start a book club — and they did.
She now has a group of friends who have all also moved to Canberra from Asian countries.
Ms Pezarkar is not alone in her experience of loneliness.
'I'm just with my loneliness sitting in my house, what do I do?'
The Canberra Girls Group quickly grew in popularity on social media. (ABC News: Rose-Cherie Galea)
What has been labelled the "loneliness epidemic" has led many craving friendship to form new social groups around the country.
The Canberra Girls Club was started in 2025 by women who were craving a way to find new friends.
The group, which hosts free exercise sessions and group walks, quickly grew in popularity on social media.
Ishu Kamboj, who joined the group in June, acknowledges friendships take time.
In the five years she's lived in the capital, she is yet to find a circle of close friends — something she attributes towards the city's transient population of workers who leave after several years.
Ishu Kamboj joined the Canberra Girls Group after five years living in the nation's capital without finding a circle of close friends. (ABC News: Rose-Cherie Galea)
"I've seen this trend of people moving away from Canberra, they move out of Canberra very quickly," Ms Kamboj said.
"I made friends and they moved away.
"I was like, 'What do I do?' I'm just with my loneliness sitting in my house, what do I do?"
The girls' group grew from 20 people to an average of 80 attendees within its first three meet-ups — many in the same boat as Ms Kamboj.
Persistent loneliness more prevalent in young people
Canberra-based counsellor Jon Nielsen said many of his clients regularly experienced loneliness, even if they didn't realise it.
"They don't always describe it as loneliness, sometimes it will just be a sense that something is not quite right, I'm not feeling good, I'm at a loose end," Mr Nielsen said.
"It can lead people into depression … and it can be quite debilitating."
Counsellor Jon Nielsen says experiencing loneliness can lead people into depression. (ABC News: Adam Kennedy)
Mr Nielsen said the usual pathways of making friends sometimes do not work when people move to a different city.
"Sometimes the patterns that we learn might work in that context but they don't necessarily work when we move to a new place,"he said.
Mr Nielsen said people may move with a partner and find themselves without an outlet for socialisation outside of their relationship.
Though many people experience moderate loneliness, some experience what experts call "persistent loneliness" — where their social connection needs are not met for an extended period of time.
In young people, the experience is prevalent in two in five people — above the national average of one in four, according to Ending Loneliness Together.
'We really need to start putting loneliness on the agenda'
Ending Loneliness Together chair Dr Michelle Lim says loneliness is a public health issue. (Supplied: Dr Michelle Lim)
CEO of Ending Loneliness Together, Michelle Lim, said there was a negative stigma around the topic of loneliness that prevented people reaching out for help.
"The way we live and the way we function in a society and in this culture means we are not actually verbalising a need to get help or support early on," she said.
"Therefore a lot of us are staying lonely and not getting the help that we need."
She considers loneliness a key public health issue.
"We need to more generally ask for help in a way that is respectful and meaningful," Dr Lim said.
"We really need to start putting loneliness on the agenda."