World Cup chance meeting leads Russian woman to her childhood Chinese pen pal, 56 years on
Photo posted on WeChat by Chinese visitor to tournament host city Saransk is recognised, helping pair to resume correspondence conducted in Russian in 1960s
A Russian grandmother has been reconnected with her pen pal in China from five decades ago, thanks to a chance encounter involving a Chinese journalist visiting Russia for the soccer World Cup, state media reported on Wednesday.
Lyudmila Mitricheva Ivanova used the Chinese name Liu Xia when she began exchanging letters 56 years ago with a young girl in China named Duan Chunxiu, according to Beijing Youth Daily, which said the international pen pals wrote to each other in Russian, mostly about their school lives.
Ivanova was quoted as saying she sent three letters to Duan and received two back, including one revealing that the Chinese girl was a pupil at the No 2 Middle School in Xiangtan in Hunan province. “Liu” also received postcards showing Hangzhou West Lake, and rose-perfumed paper made in Amoy, as well as a small photograph of Duan, the report said.
“I am 15 years old. I am studying very well. I have a happy life,” Duan told Ivanova in a letter dated 1962, which included school photos – among them a portrait of Duan wearing a scarf denoting that she was a member of the Chinese Young Pioneers, a Communist Youth League organisation for children aged 6 to 14. Duan had asked the Russian girl to reply with some photos of herself, the report said.
It was unclear why the pair lost contact, but Ivanova kept the letters and was described as being obsessed with re-establishing contact with Duan.