The friend for a day is an interesting one – but there are things that do that already. When we travelled, we used Servas, Warmshowers.org, and couchsurfing.com as ways to meet local people. Sometimes we were looking for places to stay, but we also used the sites to connect with people in various countries. In several cases our friends for a day became lifetime friends – but not always. Either way, for people who want to get out and meet random people, there are websites and organizations to help facilitate it.

Servas (http://joomla.servas.org/index.php) is a particularly interesting one, as they began after world war 2, and have been running ever since – when we did our bike trip they were in transition – having been an organization that was largely paper-based, moving into one that leverages social media and the web. I think they are still in transition.