Did you ever have a foreign penpal?

[HelmutFrontbut]

When I was 15 I had an Italian penpal; he was from Sicily and his name was Massimo. We used to write letters (his in English, mine in Italian) and swap photos, he was sooo gorgeous 😍 He invited me over but my parents forbade it, citing the mafia as a reason Never forgave them for getting in the way of love's young dream cockblocking me

Yes I did

I wrote to 3 girls my age One in Lancaster Pennsylvania (I found a postcard she had sent me whilst tidying up not long ago of the Amish), New York State and Colorado .

I had a French penpal called Jacques (IIRC), when I was 13. I had romanticised ideas we'd meet in adulthood and fall in love . In reality, I spoke no French, he spoke little English, so we only wrote a handful of times.

I signed up with school to get a penpal. I received a letter from a boy in California telling about his life. I couldn't imagine what he would find of interest about 80's North West England so I never wrote back to him.

Royal Mail used to have a pen pal club which I joined, I can’t remember the name of it though. I got matched with someone from Japan (I think you could request where you wanted them to be from) but they never wrote back to me. I was gutted!

An Amish girl? What did you talk about?

Yes, I did and still do! We've now been writing to each other for 45 years!

Chang Keun Lee from South Korea.

He used beautiful notepaper. And his English was much better than my Korean.

Yes, recently through the Letter Writer’s Alloance, and an Italian and a Swede through a club at school. Both the school ones came to visit but we never got to go to them!! Fun though.

Yes! French, American, Japanese and very briefly Spanish. I loved getting those letters, and only this morning got a card from my French friend!

I had several! Mikal from Bergen in Norway who had a big white cat and liked mixing. Damasi from Tanzania. And Misaki from Japan. I wonder where they all are now. I loved writing/getting letters from overseas.

I had a Japanese pen-pal when I was 10.
I can’t remember her name but I remember being shocked that they went to school on a Saturday. I think I thought it was torture or something

I had a german pen pal, we wrote for several year and I went to stay when I was in 6th form.

She recently messaged me on LinkedIn to ask if I remembered her.

I had an Italian penpal called Paola - we started writing when I was about 13 years old. She came to the UK a couple of times and I went to Italy. I last visited her when I was 17 - unfortunately, she was quite involved with drugs on my final visit and then she stopped replying to my letters.

Yes! An Australian girl, a French girl and a german girl as well as an Austrian boy. No idea where any of them went (have checked Facebook and no sign)

Yes I had a German penpal. We only wrote to each other a few times though then I ran out of things to say.

Yes, when I was an early teen I got a US pen pal through a magazine. It started off well but for some reason best known to myself I overshared and told her about “snogging” various boys. She stopped replying. I cringe now .

Yes I did. She was Swedish. I ended up visiting her and hoping to be swept off my feet by a Viking... We are still in touch decades later but the feet sweeping never happened

Yes...Russian and French from school and an American girl I’d met on holiday. Very sad that I lost touch with the Russian and am still in touch with the American lady...the French girl and I never really clicked.

I had a penfriend in my early teens who lived in Kenya. Her name was Lily. We wrote for about three years, then her letters stopped. No idea why, hope she just got fed up writing (I can’t have been very interesting ) and there wasn’t anything more serious. I wish i’d kept her letters. It was fifty years ago, but I still think about her occasionally and wonder what happened in her life.

I’ve lost track of mine, but my mum still writes to her school pen friend after 65 years! Theyve met quite a few times too. So lovely.

Sorry England and America. We class each other as family 😊

Yes Egyptian, set up by my dad's customer. Little did I know he seemed to have a strange idea of what a pen pal was - he wanted me to visit (offered to pay) was a bit put out my parents said no, then he was in the U.K. a few months later and wanted to marry me! Goodness knows what that crazy customer had said (he was dead by then, Egyptian guy was in the U.K. with his dad for the memorial which we also attended! No didn't have another pen pal!

Yes, a Malaysian called Winnie, a Quebecois called Marie-Helene and and Italian called Alessandra. We wrote to each other for quite some time, it was lovely. And send little videos about our families etc. I'm still friends with the Italian lady on Facebook now!

Wow, so interesting! Wonder if these people were dying to visit the uk!

Camille sorry you never met your Viking