Penpalling

United States
September 2, 2012 1:25pm CST
I've been doing it for several years now and I love it! I've made friends from different areas of the world. Not only do we write letters to each other, we trade things such as postcards, stickers, and stationery. Some of the sites I've used to find penpals are Swap-Bot, InterPals, AllPenpals, and PenpalWorld. Is anyone else into penpalling? Share your thoughts! :)
7 responses
• Philippines
3 Sep 12
Wow, I thought e-mail killed penpalling. I would definitely check these sites out. I used to have penpals in high school. I think I love the idea of doing it again! I love handwritten letters, pretty stationery and envelopes with postage stamps. E-mails give a very impersonal touch, don't you think?
• Philippines
4 Sep 12
I would like to have my kids learn the joys of having a pen pal. I used to have penpals from all over the world in high school. I get a kick out of receiving letters and postcards! I have stopped corresponding with them when I was in college, being busy with school work and all. I sure would like to know where they are now.
• United States
4 Sep 12
Yes, I agree about email being impersonal. That's why I choose to handwrite my letters. I've also found some penpals from the communities on LiveJournal.
• United States
4 Sep 12
I feel the same way! I think it's a great experience and a way to interact with people who you otherwise may never meet or speak to. I also enjoy learning about different cultures so that's another reason I like penpalling.
• Philippines
2 Sep 12
Wow! It's so nice to know that there are still people who are in to penpalling. I love doing that too when I was still in high school. I love writing letters and exchanging stories with my penpals. But now, I don't have any enpal anymore. I stopped when I was in college because I was so busy at school and of course, technology bloomed. Instead of writing letters, people prefer sending emails. But hey, I love the fact that you are exchanging stickers and stationaries. I have a collection of that too.
• United States
2 Sep 12
It's so much fun! Right now I only have 3 - 4 penpals because I'm usually busy with my daughter and I was in Cosmetology School. At one point I had about 20 penpals but some of them stopped writing to me all of a sudden. I hate when that happens! Like you said, most people are more into emailing these days and I think that's due to the fact that postage costs have risen. I wouldn't mind having some email pals. It would certainly be quicker and cheaper!
• United States
13 Sep 12
CosmoOwl12, I would love to be email pals, essentially I would just want to send you email versions of my artwork. I am going to friend you, then we can exchange emails.
• United States
18 Sep 12
Here's an article with tips on writing to penpals and some links to sites where you can find new penpals: http://www.squidoo.com/tips-for-writing-to-a-penpal (not a referral link)
@Porcospino (31366)
• Denmark
21 Sep 12
I used to have a lot of penpals from my own country and from other countries. We exchanged snail mail letters, postcards, photos, stickers, small souvenirs, cds and many other things. I still have many of those things for instance some cassette tapes and cds with music from other countries. Today I have mailfriends, but I don't write snail mail letters anymore. Sometimes I miss it and think about starting again. I will visit the sites that you mentioned and maybe I will try to find some penpals again
• United States
24 Sep 12
It's so much fun, isn't it? I just love getting things in the mail, even if it is just a letter. One of my penpals sends me CDs of photos of her friends and family so I can put faces to names when she talks about them in her letters. We've been exchanging pictures for awhile and sometimes we'll send each other disks of photos from our vacations. It's pretty neat to see what other people are up to and how they live.
• Philippines
5 Sep 12
Oh my god!! Thank you so much for posting this, because ever since (my childhood up to now), I have always wanted to have a penpal. It is more sentimental to me, and it gives me excitement because I had to wait for weeks or month(s) before I could hear from the other. And I believe, letters has more heart into it rather than the instant messages nowadays. Traditional letters has more significance, because we could see the real effort of the writer. I would really like to find a penpal from the sites you've mentioned, but I can't help but feel wariness because, I'll be giving my address to a perfect stranger just so we could exchange letters, it's really risky eh? But I hope everything will be fine. Thanks for the interesting post! :D
• United States
5 Sep 12
So far, I haven't had any problems with writing to penpals! The worst thing about it for me is that some people just stop writing for no reason. But then I usually send them a letter asking if they are still interested in being penpals and if I don't get a reply, I look for a new penpal! If you choose to use InterPals.net, be careful because there are a lot of perverted men from third world countries on that site. You can always choose to block them or ignore their messages, but they will almost always message a new female on the site.
• Philippines
3 Sep 12
I haven't tried penpalling. But I think it's cool. I thought penpals does not exist nowadays. Hahaha. well, in the new era. Anyways, I really like to experienceing to write letters. :)
• United States
4 Sep 12
There are a lot of people all over the world who still penpal! I've had penpals from the United States, China, Australia, Canada, and a few other countries.
• United States
13 Sep 12
I LOVE creating postcards, my original artwork on postcards. Thank you for posting those sites. I am gonna try them. I will get back with you once I play around with them. Thanks
• United States
14 Sep 12
That is a great idea! I wish I could paint or draw so I could use my artwork for different things. Let me know which sites you like the most.
• Philippines
25 Sep 12
Nowadays, with technology, the stuff is commonly done by emails. We can gain penpals through the internet and exchange emails even though some people say that it's sincere to exchange mails in a form of handwritten letter. I used to have several penpals during my highschool years but now I've given up on this hobby. But I admit, this hobby is fun!