After 43 years of exchanging letters, two penpals, one from Newfoundland and one from Singapore, met in person for the first time this week.
For decades they’ve been “sharing our best times and our worst times together in letters,” said Sonya Clarke Casey. “We always signed off saying ‘I hope someday we will meet.’ But it never really felt like we really would.”
Clarke Casey and Michelle Anne Ng connected through a school penpal program in 1983, when they were both in Grade 5.
They started writing to each other – and never stopped.
Sitting together in St. John’s, the two women sift through stacks of letters they’ve kept for decades: cursive scrawling for pages, carefully selected stationary, envelopes with little notes and drawings.
Clarke Casey laughs, reading from a letter she wrote in 1992: “The weather here is starting to warm up. Today it’s 4 degrees! Do you have a boyfriend now?”
Ng pulls out another letter where she talks about liking the song 99 Luftballoons: “it’s like four pages long!” she laughs, while Clarke Casey remembers how excited she was to get such a lengthy letter.
As kids, they looked forward to each other’s letters, which would take weeks to deliver from across the world.
Ng would share about life in Singapore, sending newspaper clippings about local teen fashion; while Clarke Casey wrote from Carbonear, N.L., drawing a map of her local swimming pond. Sonya recalls telling Michelle all about when Prince Charles and Diana visited Harbour Grace, and the excitement of seeing them in person.
It was a cultural exchange – and the beginning of a lifelong friendship.
As the letters piled up, the women became closer – writing through university, travels and life changes. Clarke Casey recalls writing to Ng that she was pregnant with her first child.
“It’s kind of nice to reflect back on your life and think, what was I doing in 1984?” said Clarke Casey. “I have no way to really know that for sure besides those letters.”
As times changed, the friends started to add in email and Facetime– but they still send each other handwritten letters.
“There is nothing like a letter in the mail,” said Clarke Casey.
Ng remembers being “exhilarated” when she got her first letter from Carbonear, N.L.
Sonya remembers the excitement of her dad bringing in the mail, and telling her parents facts she learned about Singapore.
The friends had always hoped they could meet in person, but got more serious about the idea in recent years. When the opportunity arose, Ng jumped to come visit.
“I couldn’t sleep the night before, I was so excited,” said Clarke Casey, who made a sign to greet Ng at the airport. She got teary as she talked about meeting her friend.
“We just gave each other a big hug and said ‘I can’t believe it.’ “We’re finally meeting each other after 43 years. It’s pretty special.”
They spent their first night together reading through old letters, laughing and reminiscing.
“It’s funny how you can feel that connection to somebody just through a letter,” said Clarke Casey.
Meeting in person certainly doesn’t mean the end of writing letters, however.
“This friendship I believe will be all the way through to when we grow old together,” said Ng.
“Nothing’s going to stop us from writing to each other.”
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