Around the Pembroke Pines Charter High School (PPCHS) campus, students will find friendships all around the school. All types of dynamics, duos, trios, and large friend groups with people from different backgrounds and grade levels come together to build connections.
In the Charter system, it’s almost impossible to not find people who haven’t been friends for a while, even going as far as kindergarten.
Hannah Ikner and Lian Lee, PPCHS seniors, met in the fifth grade. Ikner had just transferred to a new school, eager to make new friends and let her social side shine. Lee, however, was shy and didn’t seem to want an encounter with Ikner.
“One day, we just started to play Roblox together, and then everything clicked. I’m a lot louder and she’s quieter, and she always keeps me in check,” Ikner says, explaining the duo’s dynamic. But with long-term friendships, the connections are inevitably going to change, for better or for worse.
Ikner and Lee both had their ups and downs. During the COVID-19 pandemic, like many others, they both lost touch, barely talked, or sent a simple text. Then, school started back, and it was like nothing ever happened.
Lee theorized on how they were to connect so fast again. “We’ve spent so much time together, and picked up each other’s humor and mannerisms,” she says. “It was easy to feel as if nothing had ever changed.” Both girls are going their separate ways soon, hoping that they never lose touch and stay friends for life.
They aren’t the only seniors at PPCHS to build an established friendship. Seniors Stacey Fung and Sahana Sathiyaseelan have been friends for many years; playing in the band class with the same instrument was the push they needed to begin their friendship.
As their friendship continued to grow, they were able to add more friends to their group, which switched up their dynamic, but never weakened it. In fact, they found themselves relying on each other more.
“Even if we go our separate ways, I think we’ll always be close,” Fung says, with a hopeful tone for the future.
Freshmen Jaden Perez and Juan Bustamante have had the privilege of knowing each other since the first grade. Their friendship began as just small talk on the brightly colored carpet in class, and slowly evolved as the years went by.
Perez and Bustamante have already found ways to find a routine and support each other in hard times. “We encourage each other to do things that will improve whatever is going on,” Perez says, whilst talking about their hardships.
Making friends isn’t the easiest thing in the world, but it’s important to do. Forming long-lasting relationships to help support, laugh, and cry with each other only makes life better. Friends can come and go, but the ones that stay are the ones to treasure.
