You put the money in, and in back of the machine a real
person trained by the Friendship Vending NGO walks out
and befriends you. For more pay this person becomes
your
best friend, listening to your problems, steering you
away
from trouble and helping you out in need, laughing when
you
are funny, sympathizing with your sorrow and just
enjoying the conversation with you.
You cannot reach this friend by phone, letters or
computer,
nor by any other device other than seeking this person
personally, at the location of the vending machine. Using
the vending machine you can check when your friend is
available or choose to just talk with someone else.
As a true friend, the friend will also assist in preventing
the
client's addiction to the Friendship Vendor service, and
from becoming physically bonded with the friend. In
order
to assist with the friendship sustainability, the friend
presents a fictitious very friendly person with a fictitious
background, family and history, all supplied by the NGO,
assisting and protecting the friend from any attachments
outside the Friendship Vending environment.
Friendship Vending also provides assistance with mean or
bad people who only intend to vandalize the friendship
or
mock it. The FV friends are given cognitive practice
sessions, crisis management and discussion skill
workshops,
and are released to the public only after successfully
passing an intensive course.
A security unit of FV watches over the operation and is
available at hand if anything goes violent.
There is also a fund for helping raise awareness and for
raising the venture capital needed for the ongoing
operations of FV, when times are slow. This is called the
Friends of Friendship Vending Fund.
Just a note: Friendship Vending friends are barred from
becoming members of Friends of Friendship Vending.
===
[Edited with following clarification]
The vriending machine is regular sized, like an ATM. The
FV friend will be notified via phone about the
befriending request.
The friend can be anyone who passes the course
successfully, and waits for befrienders in the FV van,
parked somewhere nearby. Or in a nearby hotel lobby. If
the befriender is a homeless person or someone on low
income, the FV will supply housing and a car. The friend
can sit with the befriender in FV approved publicly open
locations nearby, no need to stay standing in the rain.