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Pen pal programs endure in a digital age

91 points by petethomas

by TFNA

3 subcomments

The pen-pal phenomenon flourished in a time when letters were exceedingly cheap to send, even internationally. People in the Eastern Bloc seized on such programs for international contacts because sending letters was very accessible even to them.
Fast forward to today, and the cost of sending an ordinary paper letter in my country is now 3€. Lots of people would be reluctant to pay that time and time again, and forget about juggling a large number of pen-pals as people commonly did back in the day.

by codecutter

0 subcomment

I used to have 34 penfriends when I was in high school. I got all these pen pals from organisation called "International Youth Service (IYS)" based in Turku, Finland. Eventually I lost touch with my penfriends when I moved due to education, jobs etc.
My very first penfriend was Betty Marie Jensen from a small place called Nibe, Denmark. I tried to find her on the internet, sent a letter to her old address. No luck. All I know is her name, old address and birthdate. I have her photos, but I don't want to publish them on the internet for her privacy. Is there any government agency besides postal service who can forward my letter to her?
Recently, I tried to revive this hobby. Unfortunately, IYS is closed now. I found a few good penpals on GlobalPenfriends.com Also tried several other websites like Interpals, Penpal World etc. but they are full of scammers.

by whiteleopard

4 subcomments

by jermaustin1

0 subcomment

I remember having a pen pal from Ukraine around the year 2000 (7th-9th grade - can't remember when anymore). It was fun, but really only lasted the single school year. We were told to exchange email addresses and not physical addresses, but she didn't have an email (or didn't actually want to continue lol). Either way it was cute for a couple of 12-14 year olds from across the globe to discuss the differences in our lives.

by fnordian_slip

0 subcomment

I can give a recommendation for /r/fountainpenpals, if you're into fountain pens. And if not, check out/r/fountainpens or the fountainpennetwork forum and get into it, it's fun and doesn't have to be expensive :)

by LennyHenrysNuts

0 subcomment

There's also a subreddit for international pen friends for adults. It jives with their fountain pen subreddit pretty well.

by vmilner

1 subcomments

by AFF87

0 subcomment

0 subcomment