Most girls, specifically those my age, are attracted to the boys with the social status — the boys who are into the latest fashion trends that they themselves set or follow wholeheartedly, the boys who have a swarm of friends who worship the ground they walk on.

Simply put, the boys who are popular and model a physique that places them in the same league with Will Smith and Tyson Beckford.

Strangely enough, I find myself being drawn to the boys who are of a completely opposite description: The boy who spends time fulfilling his desire to learn new things, be it about history, science, mathematics or the very common "computer;" the boy whose friends are a select few and who are similar to him; the boy who often keeps himself neat and looking presentable, without wearing tight-fitting pants and a shoe that costs at least $700; the boy who owns a pair of glasses that he is unable to survive without - not fashion lenses, the frames and shape of this glasses portray such intense simplicity; one may not notice him wearing them and consider it another feature to his face that he was born with; simply put, a boy who is often called or considered to be a nerd.

On discovery of my "strange attraction," I quickly labeled it as a phase. My friends and all the other people I communicated with on a daily basis could not be granted the opportunity to detect my awkward feelings, for they are a group of individuals who are frequently outcast.

Every time I met a boy who was passionate about debating a topic or issue and stood firm on his opinion, it made me hope I could get to know him more.

However, that barely ever happened because I was too busy pretending to not even have the thought of communicating with someone who coincided with such a description.

By fourth form, my phase became a year old, and by fifth form, I brought myself to face the reality that it was no longer a phase.

When I finally worked up the confidence to talk to a boy who fit the description (yes, I had to "work up the confidence" to talk to someone society perceived as having not an ounce of confidence himself), I couldn't help but to be keen while conversing with him, having discussions that were never fixed or stereotyped.

Of course, there were a few moments of awkward silence, but I was a nervous wreck during most of it, and believe it or not, he appeared as calm as the eye of a storm.

We exchanged e-mail addresses and I took his phone number, and over a period of time we became really good friends.

Before finishing my O'Level exams, I told two of my closest friends and a family member about what I once called my phase, and they simply responded with a reassuring "OK." I get teased a few times from the family member (my cousin), but when it comes down to it, they could not have been more understanding.

Becoming so close to someone whom society has stamped with a vast number of labels taught me that I should never judge someone by the way he or she looks.

It humbled me in such a way that people I swore I would never and could never talk to, I formed relationships with.
There's nothing wrong with setting standards, but if those standards keep us in ignorance, they definitely need to be altered.

So, before you meet a boy with the "weirdest" or most "pointless" hobbies on Earth, who seems to be the only one in the science classes who is never uninterested in what the teacher has to say, or one who appears to devote all his time to only the things of an academic nature, and you decide you won't have anything to do with him, think again, because at the end of the day, in an environment where things are taken less seriously, he'd live up to the saying "boys will be boys" on many occasions.

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