Anonymous asked:

I have also met someone through an online penpal site who happens to be Korean and originally from Korea. My initial intentions on the site were just to make friends where we could exchange our culture and language. Eventually it lead to chatting on instant messenger. After chatting with him a few times over a span of several months, he ‘confessed’ to me and a week later used ‘I love you’, although I had my doubts about him truly liking me because we only chatted sporadically (about every other week).

It’s been over a year since meeting online and recently he has mentioned wanting to meet me, despite us living very far from each other (he seemed more serious than usual). We are both not living in Korea.

Most of the time it seems like he is just joking, but this time it seems he might be real. He began to talk about marriage and such things. I’m beginning to think that maybe him liking me was sincere, since he brought up (in my opinion) such a serious topic. I like him too, but because I have never met him in person, I feel nervous. I have met other online friends in real life before, but that’s because we were just friends and nothing more (no emotional attachments).

I would just like some insight on what your thoughts are about forming a relationship online and about the discussion of marriage like this. Do you think he is serious if he has waited this long to bring up this topic? And how much weight should I put on the words “I love you”? I have not told him those words because to me it carries a lot of weight before I can say it to someone.

Was there anything you did to prepare for your meeting in person?

Thank you again for having this site, I think it will be a great help to many people.

Thank you for your question. We hope this site would be helpful to many people, but that’s just our wishful thinking.

To be honest, at first I thought “What kind of people fall in love without even hearing each other’s voice!?” Then I remembered: “Oh, people like Kimchi Man and me”. ^^ I think the reason I forgot this little fact about our relationship is because it is so difficult to believe anyone can fall in love from just chatting. But it happened to us.

Finding boyfriend online is perfectly normal these days. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was more common than meeting offline.

I can not tell you how much or for how long you need to chat before you can be sure he is serious. Or before you can be sure you are serious, and not just having a crush. Kimchi Man and I both had a hard time believing that person living on the other side of the world could truly love us even though we were so certain of our own feelings. We worried that even if feelings are true the distance could never be defeated.

But what got us through it is that we took it one step at a time. Between the day we confessed to each other and the day we met at the airport 4 months had passed, and during that time we talked a lot more and got to know each other even better. When we both made our way to the airport there was no doubt left in us that the other person is truly in love.

I don’t think that forming a relationship online is any more difficult. Or any less real. I don’t know how far away you are from each other but long distance for us seems to be a much bigger problem. Korea is a long way from Europe. However, it is nothing that can’t be surmounted.

I find it a bit surprising that he would talk about marriage so fast, and if you are only in contact every other week. However, each couple has their own pace. As does every person. It is good you haven’t said you love him if you don’t feel ready. But try to relax and enjoy this exciting time of your life. Expectation can be just as sweet as the real thing.

To prepare for the big day when we meet, we showed each other our passports and our diplomas to prove we were telling the truth about everything. We sent packages to make the relationship feel more tangible. It was usually candy and cute little things (I got an oven mitt shaped like a fox :) ), but I was truly stunned when he sent me his dog tags. Korean guys who do army service have to wear them for two years and I knew they meant a lot to him.

You don’t need to do anything special to prepare, just make sure you use your common sense not to put yourself in danger. For our warnings about meeting someone in person who you previously only met online check out the end of our post about meeting Koreans online.

For our readers with similar doubts we have How to know if a Korean guy likes you and How to get a Korean guy to like you. It’s not what you think;).