Pen Friends

I have a lovely pen friend thanks to Gransnet

I have had several penfriends,the first at school, a french girl, which didnt last long,due to the language barrier mainly, then a boy i met on a school trip to Paris,he was Irish,
I had a few American soldier penfriends. i met one who looked completely different to his photo, much slimmer and younger than he was when i met him he brought lots of presents,including a Charles an Diana commemorative cup, which i still have., he asked me to marry him, but wanted to come and live with me, in England, which worried me,in case he was trying to get away from something,but said no anyway
Also had a soldier penfriend serving in the Falklands, i had a feeling he was gay, not that it mattered, but after he left i got a huge bouquet and some Chloe perfume
I have an American penfriend at the moment who i met on a health forum, due to us having a similiar health problem, he is a bit younger and also gay, been writing to him for about 10 years now, very nice letters mainly about our love of animals, mostly cats

I had 2 pen friends in Japan. Sadly when I left school I stopped corresponding and when I went to japan there was not response from their old addresses.

I did enjoy the correspondence, still have some of it, and regret I did not keep up with them.

At primary school each member of our class was given a penfriend to write to from a school in Somerset. We wrote for a while, then our classes met up at the Bath and West show. All I remember is that it was extremely muddy, my wellie boot got stuck in the mud and I trod in the mud with just my sock on! She probably thought I was embarrassing and our friendship died out soon after.
At senior school we were offered Swedish penfriends. I wrote to a girl and we got on really well and when I had a tape recorder one Christmas we also sent each other tapes, as she wanted to practise understanding English and I tried to learn Swedish. She was a great fan of the Hep Stars (the so-called 'Swedish Beatles'. Later, Benny Andersson of the Hep Stars was in ABBA). One summer she wrote to say her father had to come to London on business and he was taking her with him; she asked if they could come and stay with us in Bristol. Of course we said yes! We put another bed in my room for her and redecorated the spare room for her father. At the last minute there was a train strike and they couldn't get to Bristol, so we never actually met. I think our friendship fizzled out when boyfriends came on the scene but I sometimes wonder what became of her.

In 1959 I did a student exchange holiday with Michele. We kept in touch by post for a few years but it gradually petered out. Imagine our surprise when she knocked in the door of my parents house 1986. My son opened the door as my parents had been staying with me and we were driving back to London. She was with her husband Jean Pierre (who I had met when on the exchange) and two young daughters. It was lovely catching up and although we exchanged addresses the letters gradually dropped off.

When my sister and I were at school, in Glasgow, in the 60’s, the school set us up with penfriends to improve our French and Spanish. We corresponded with a couple of Algerian boys, for a couple of years. Mum wasn’t keen and would warn us that one day they would turn up on our doorstep. We scoffed,
In 1971, I moved to London and went to a nightclub with a friend. She took up with a ‘French’ boy and I was left with his friend, ade idedly uncool looking fellow wearing a gold lurex suit. He walked me along Oxford Street to get my late night bus home to Hampstead. We chatted and he was impressed that I was Scottish. He told me he was on his way to Scotland, indeed to Glasgow. In the interests of maintaining conversation, I asked him where he was off to, exactly. He took out a notebook and there was my address. He had been my sister’s penfriend! I tried to put him off by saying she had left home. She was actually engaged by then. I phoned her to tell her he might be on his way. Mum, of course, said she’d told us so.
He must have believed me as he never showed up. Nice enough chap but it was such a coincidence.

When we first started to learn French at school(age 12) we had a magazine in French to help us. In the magazine we could write in for a French penfriend and that is how Violette and I began what has been a 51 year friendship.

We have visited each other many many times and I always felt part of her family whilst staying with her. My parents put me on a plane to Paris aged 13 and her family met me the other end (imagine that happening now!) It was an enormous learning curve but we are the best of friends. She was one of my bridesmaids in 1978 and I was her main Witness in 2016 when she eventually married later in life.

We still write, email and visit each other regularly. I write in French and she writes in English.

As a child I had 3 lenfriends. One in what was then called the Gold Coast (Ghana) who kept aski g me to send her things like pictures of the Queen so I got a bit fed up with her eventually. Another was a Frech girl cslled Francoise from Saintes which was arranged through school but I never met her. Her Engkish was pretty bad and I found it funny. On one occasion she said the school was closed as all the girls were hills. (Ill I suppose). Mind you my French was probably worse. She sent me what we would now call a friendship bracelet (according to GC) but she called it a Scoobidoo! This correspondence gradually petered out too.
The third was an English girl from Canvey Island who I wrote to for yeats and eventually we met as teenagers - I went to stay at her house and later she came to stay with me. We didn't really hit it off and after that we gradually stopped writing. Still it was fun having pen friends at the time!

Sorry about all the typos! My excuse is small keyboard on my phone and fat fingers (and lack of editing!).

Remember friendsreunited? I found quite a few old friends and neighbours through that website. I googled an old boyfriend recently and found his obituary!

Pen friends though - I was bad at keeping up and writing in French. I got lazy and wrote in English and my pen pal didn't write back. She lived in Champagne country which I thought so exotic.

I love getting real letters. The only people who send me real letters are the NHS and ofcourse a few birthday cards and Christmas although fewer are sending these now.
It's so nice to receive a handwritten letter. It's mostly junk mail now which goes straight in the recycle bin.

Well, Chewbacca, thank you, what a thrilling thread this has been for me. After writing about my Swedish penfriend above and reading JackyB's comment about looking hers up recently, I got to wondering if I could track down my Swedish penfriend.
I put her name into Facebook and one came up in the same town. I just had to send a message to see if she was the same person and she replied to say she was! She was amazed because she had discovered my 50 year-old letters just 6 months ago.
She sent me her email address so I have replied and I'm hoping to hear more of what she has been doing since then.

Wow HillyN that is brilliant news, I'm really pleased for you and your penfriend. You'll have years of news and events to catch up on and so much to share. I must admit that I too googled Stella Lim, my old pen friend, but found no trace of her, but I'm delighted that you found yours. You've made my day!

I had a pen friend from New Zealand all through my teenage and early twenties years. We were both huge fans of The Monkees. She worked in London for a while, and we spoke once on the telephone. It was during this time that we lost touch. I would love to find her again, ask how her life turned out, if she achieved all she set out to do. I don't know where to start though.

What a lovely thread. Think there's been a similar one recently. At my girls grammar school in about 1960/61 we were randomly given the names and addresses of pupils at a mixed grammar school in Arras in northern France. Half of us got boys, of course. We exchanged letters half in French and half in English til he left school and I continued writing every now and then in French. I had the opportunity to visit him and his parents in 1966. Then he met and married his wife in the same year DH and I married. We holidayed in Paris and went to see them. All four of us got on and the friendship grew so much so that I was invited to be godmother to their youngest daughter. We spent many happy camping holidays with them when our DDs were young. Latterly we've been having long weekends with then every other year. Sadly he died last year when DH was recovering from surgery. DH was too ill to travel and I couldn't leave him so we didn't get to see him before he died. Thanks to a lift from his niece who is married to an Englishman, we were able to attend his funeral. He was such a lovely man, a privilege to have known him and his lovely wife and family.