The joy of still being in touch with your pen pal and seeing them in real life (IRL) - more than two decades on
Here's to friendships built and maintained worlds and literally thousands of kilometres apart, originally formed by ink - and imagination.
Did you ever have a pen pal? It's a hobby that goes back decades and decades. I’m not sure when it exactly dates back to, but there was Catherine the Great and Voltaire in the 1760s, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis in the early 1930s and late 1949, and Margot Frank and Betty Ann Wagner in 1940.
According to one source, the word pen pal came into use in 1913. But letters have been exchanged for centuries, serving as a way for people to connect across vast distances. Organised pen pal exchanges gained popularity in the mid-20th century, post- World War II, to foster international understanding.
What’s the modern day equivalent of pen pals? Maybe Twitter and Facebook friends? As mentioned in my last post, I’ve met a few Twitter (now X) mates IRL.
But before these I had several pen pals and I've met up with four in real life. This includes one from France, and his two boys, who I saw today in London. More than two decades after we began writing to each other.
I was put in touch with Laura, my first pen pal, through my Canadian grandfather's curling club. We met physically in real life on a trip to the country with my family in the early 90s. But the friendship unfortunately fizzled out. I can’t remember why exactly.
A few years later however, there was a mid-noughties pen pal craze, just as the internet was arriving. I can't actually remember the name of the scheme. But it was somewhere in-between Tamogotchis and 90210 trading cards, two other crazes of that era.
I can’t remember the exact details of how it worked. But you effectively bought a person - or a few and then got sent their details. Yes, it probably sounds a bit like human trafficking. But it was all completely innocent - and worth it if you still have friends from this more than two decades later.
I wrote mainly snail mail to my pen pals and also sent photos. I kept the letters in a wooden basket behind my door in my room.
My first pen friend was Alison who lived in Mississauga in Toronto, a huge multicultural city very different from the small, monocultural town of Murwillumbah in northern NSW in Australia. I was in high school. We wrote for about a year. When I went to Canada with my family one Christmas my parents took me to meet up with her.
Alison and I got on quite well. We stayed in touch and she stayed with me in London in 2009 when I was living there the first time. I went to stay with her in Canada in 2006 and later. We've lost contact in the past few years, mainly since I’m not on Facebook. Who knows maybe we'll reconnect one day.
A redhead Welsh girl called Tegwen was my next pen friend. We also wrote to each other for about a year. When I came on my first trip to the UK in 2005 I went to stay with her and her family in Bangor, north Wales and she took me all around the area. It was such a fascinating trip as that part of the country is quintessentially Welsh. We've since sadly also lost touch.
But I’m still in touch with Fabien, from France, who I started writing to in the late 90s. We met in real life when I moved to London in 2007. I also met his then girlfriend now wife Valeriya, a very kind woman from Ukraine. I met them a couple more times in Paris and stayed with them in November 2021 on the outskirts of the city.
They showed me around, fed me well and when they sent me off at the end of the week packed my suitcase with champagne. (Did I mention that pen pals are great? Just kidding). In addition to their two sweet boys they also have the world’s biggest dog who gets a lot of attention!
We don’t stay in touch that regularly. I’ve moved around a bit. But weeks ago I got in touch with Fabien to see if he was enjoying the Paris Olympics. He mentioned that he was coming to London and bringing the two boys to practise their English for the week. I suggested meeting up.
I got the tube to Covent Garden and I bought them fish and chips at an Irish pub. We talked about the elections in France and the UK, Brexit (of course), and rent prices in Paris, London and Sydney.
Valeriya had kindly sent me some Lancome cosmetics even though I’d told her I didn’t need anything when she’d asked. (Did I mention that pen pals are great? JUST KIDDING!) The two boys were very excited about being in an Irish pub, only disappointed that the Irish barman who they’d met last time wasn’t there!
There was that delight in meeting a friend IRL when you’re not on social media and getting to catch up on their news and hear about it straight from the horse’s mouth when you don’t already know it because you’ve seen it all online.
It was lovely to see them and it also got me thinking about the pen pal phenomenon. Today there’s some references in culture to this. Online dating can be seen as a modern-day evolution of pen pals.
But you could also go your whole life without having a pen pal. And even if you’re lucky to have one, you can go your whole life without meeting your pen pal in person. I wonder if the person who dreamt up pen pals ever intended for real life meet-ups?
Meeting pen friends in real life also takes me back to a time before online only friendships.
In the noughties, before mobile phones and social media arrived, you were forced to make an effort. “I’ll see you on the steps of Town Hall,” you said - and you had to be there. There was no easy excuse to get out of it, unless you were actually going to stand the person up which would have involved a physical confrontation and discomfort that just about no one wanted to go through. “Ghosting” was a term that we’d never heard of.
Today we don’t even see good friends as much as we should. Some of us never meet work colleagues. There’s a term - the joy of cancelled outings (JOCO) - used to describe celebrating when events are cancelled, that seven in ten Brits are said to have experienced.
Of course this isn’t unique to the UK. But it seems that in London in particular, an enormous city where people are spoilt for choice and it’s hard to get around, some people don't like to go out of their neighbourhood. There’s jokes on social media about trying to catch up with Brits and being given a date three months in advance.
Meeting someone you’ve only known through letters in real life is a unique experience. It fosters a cultural exchange and genuine human connection. In today’s digital world, where superficial online interactions often dominate, pen pals remind us of the value of face-to-face relationships and meeting different people. I’ve never had that much in common with any of mine, but then maybe that’s the whole point.
So here’s to friendship built and maintained worlds and thousands of distance apart, but originally united by ink - and imagination. Discovering then sharing cultural quirks then life’s progress and setbacks is special. And just like today’s kids are discovering flip phones and Friends, maybe one day they’ll discover the joy and magic of having a pen pal - and then meeting them IRL.