Pen pals from around the world
5I’ve been toying with the idea of setting my kids up with international pen pals. I Googled and saw a couple of services out there for this purpose. My problem is a distinct lack of trust.
Does anyone have firsthand experience with any of these? What services have you actually used and what are your thoughts?
- 11 comments, 17 replies
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I get emails from a Nigerian Prince occasionally.
He seems friendly…
@daveinwarsh Me too!! He seems very generous with his money.
@ConAndLibrarian @daveinwarsh And he is so polite!
@daveinwarsh
I’ve actually considered replying just to waste their time, but I lack imagination and patience.
/youtube scamalot Nigerian prince
I had a penpal from Turkey from age 13 to about 19. We sent each other magazine clippings of hot guys, traded music, photos, etc she was studying to be an attorney. I kept all the letters and have two scrapbooks full of her letters and the momentos. She was teaching me words in Turkish, and I taught her about the history of the US since she could read English. Then, after I went away to college, life went on for both of us and it wasn’t until at least 30 years, I went on Facebook in 2010 international, and looked for her. Her name is very common, so I searched for her face, the size of a thumbprint on the Facebook site. I remembered her brother’s name, so I looked him up. I found him immediateoy and said, hi do you remember me, I was your sisters pen-pal. It was so amazing, he connected me to her on Facebook…and I was able to send all of those old family photos back to her and a box of American sweets and treats. We talk on Facebook, she’s an attorney in Instanbul and now I can follow her and she can follow me through Facebook and Instagram. One of the neatest friendships of my life. The penpal service was through the post office back in the early 80’s.
My granddaughters have been doing this and it’s great. Can’t remember what my daughter said it was through but she really likes the fact that they’re doing it. Especially since the art of writing letters is becoming a thing of the past.
@lseeber
If you find out, please let me know.
@jst1ofknd Will do
@jst1ofknd Ok… so I spoke to my daughter last night. She told me she did NOT get their penpals from any online site (but they DO do the postcard thing). She was reluctant to try those. What she did do she told me was 2 different things. One of her friends mom was from Germany so she asked her if she knew anyone over there that could write English that would penpal with her daughters and she set them up with a friends kids over there. The other thing she did was got the names of some people through a missionary at church. She felt like she could trust those sources better.
@lseeber
Thank you! Those are both great ideas!
@jst1ofknd @lseeber I was going to suggest speaking to a church or their school, especially if the school system has an exchange program. If they do, they probably have trustworthy contacts
@lseeber @mehbee
Another great suggestion. Our kids are pretty much home schooled.
Pretty much in that my wife is in charge of their day to day school, but we don’t have to pay for anything. It’s a charter school paid for by my property taxes.
https://epiccharterschools.org
Inevitably, he or she will try to sell your kids penis enlargement products…
Why not ask on meh? These is a vibrant community of literary geniuses. I’m from Texas if you want letters cowboy let me know.
@reclaimercube
/image meh genius
If trust is your issue, write the letters and send them to me, then I’ll rewrite them in my own words and send it along, and vice versa.
Oh, and they’re also doing Postcard Exchange, I think she mentioned to me a couple of weeks ago that they had gotten like 12 postcards just that week from people in about 8 dif countries.
Postcards connecting the world
@lseeber
This sounds amazing! I’ll look further into it when I get back from work.
I’d love to have a pen pal. I saw a story one time about a lady who was a pen pal, International Big sister, something to a child in another country and the impact each made on the other’s life was very touching. I’d do that if I could find a reputable contact.
@mehbee
If I find anything specific I’ll post it.
@jst1ofknd That would be great
This is pretty thoughtful. I liked this stuff as a kid, even if it was the school the next town over.
Sounds silly but what about answering letters for Santa around Christmas time?
@Targaryen Well… in order to answer, they’d have to address their Santa letters to them, no?
@lseeber https://about.usps.com/holidaynews/operation-santa.htm
@djslack Cool beans. Nice experience. (However temporary)
@djslack @lseeber I was going to post that. Yeah, a lot of times Santa letters are answered by postal staff or other groups like they might drop some off to an old folks home for them to answer.
I had a Malaysian pen pal when I was too young to have a pen pal. We were paired via a pen pal company that might have been affiliated with a church. I did enjoy sending and receiving international mail with the red and blue hashes around the edges of the piece.
/image pen pal international mail