by Audrey-Anastasia Alleyne

Created on: April 14, 2008

The Good Ole Days of Pen Friendship

Pen friendship still exists today despite the intervention of the Internet.Pen friendship by the "snail mail" method has however lost some of its allure; but when compared to friendship made on the Internet, the good ole days of pen friends or pen pals must be remembered.

Unlike Internet friendship which from all accounts, is something to be wary of; there was certain purity about pen pals. Today, unwittingly I have found myself with two Internet friends, which reminds me of pen-friends. One of them found me on a tutor web-site, spokenskills.com four years ago. She wrote me asking a question about the site; and we corresponded for a while. What was my surprise last week to find an e-mail from this person, asking if I remembered her! The e-mail had been done by clicking into one of our former e-mails. Since then we have been corresponding like crazy and have promised to upkeep it.

My other Internet friend, I found on Helium. A few weeks ago I wrote an article which impressed him so much, that he wrote me commending me on that article. Since then, we too have been corresponding heartily.

I wonder if these two friendships will survive the years, like some of my pen friends did in the past. Among my most memorable pen pal experiences is the Martiniquan experience.

I was, and am still passionate about the French language, people and culture. I lived in Trinidad and Tobago and I wanted to make friends with French people. At first, I chose the nearest French speaking Caribbean island, Martinique. So, I wrote to a Martiniquan newspaper called France-Antilles.

Believe it or not, I received over 300 letters, the first time. The second ad brought me 268 responses from all over the beautiful island of flowers. What joy I had, when each day the mailman arrived, his hands laden with a bundle of letters for me. What a delight it was in opening them and in choosing those with well-written French.

Eventually I went on a French Caribbean cruise and met eight of my pen-friends. One of them was even a staff member of the newspaper. Another was a young Frenchman who was doing military service in Martinique. I eventually visited him in Normandy, France on my first trip to that country. One of the pen-friends in Martinique, Henri, later visited me in Trinidad. Accompanying him was his female traveling companion, Virginie. My friends and I offered them such wonderful hospitality, that when I revisited the island two years later with other friends, we were treated like royalty.

Today, after almost forty years and several visits to Martinique, Virginie, Henri and
I still communicate with each other.

I have had several other enjoyable pen-friend experiences. Of course there were the quirks, like the German guy who had a host of weapons concealed under his bed. He wanted to keep me as a prize possession; but fortunately, friends I met while traveling in Germany rescued me from that situation. Over all, the good experiences outweigh the
uncanny ones.

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