Mail-Order Bride Demystified

Confession of a former romance novelist

The practice of finding so-called mail-order brides started in 1614 in the US.

The early pioneers posted advertisements in newspapers and magazines seeking wives from the East (of the US) to join them. These lonely men wanted wives to help them settle the frontier.

Flash forward to the late 1970s to the 1980s when the mail-order bride industry, or international matchmaking, saw a boom.

This time, older men from the West sought brides from the Far East, with women from the Philippines said to be the leading source of mail-order brides.

According to The New York Times Magazine in a 1986 article, quoting a thrice-divorced American, formerly in the Navy and who joined the mail-order bride service, “women [in the Far East] are truer, more loyal and have a mystical air or attitude”.

(Whether such men found their belief to be accurate was another matter.)

Pitching this controversial issue to my publisher was a breeze.

With my first romance novel approved for release in the Philippine market, I pitched my mail-order-bride idea to my publisher for my second book.

The topic of mail-order brides was hot. It was gaining notoriety with lightning speed. My publisher approved my next romance-book project straight away. I immediately set off to do my research.

Men seeking wives from overseas did not actually order brides through the mail.

Men from Australia and New Zealand, North America and Europe did not really order brides by mail.

That Western men could order wives by mail was insinuated and fostered by the media. Controversy and sensational issues sell, and that one could order a spouse by mail sold newspapers and magazines. Men seeking Asian brides advertised in the personals section of English newspapers of the relevant country.

An example of this advert:

John Doe, age 59, widowed, working in the catering industry, looking to correspond with educated ladies who enjoy cooking, age 21–29, with view to marriage. Will only reply to letters with pictures enclosed. My address: 123 Hope Drive, Strawberry Hills, NSW, Australia.

Majority of men, however, registered in overseas pen-pal agencies, which was a euphemism for so-called mail-order bride agencies. By using agencies, men did not have to reveal their names and address.

An example of an agency advert:

Dick, age 66, living comfortably in retirement, looking for pretty Filipina up to age 35 for love and marriage. Reply with two photos: one full shot, one close-up. Bob (code 789-X), Rainbow Romance Agency, 456 Faith Avenue, Sacramento, CA, USA.

These pen-pal / marriage agencies in the western hemisphere had partner agencies in Manila.

The agencies’ role was to register women as non-paying members who were treated like ordinary job applicants. They filled out extensive bio-data forms. Their photos were taken by the agency photographer in the office, in various shots.

Well-funded local agencies also took video clips of these women introducing themselves. Their personal data, photos, and video were then compiled in individual dossiers and sent to their mother agency.

Meanwhile, members of the overseas mother agency would then choose from the files of female Asian members. Premium members were given access to all files.

Those on the cheapest membership package could only view a selected number of files — without the contact address.

After choosing which women they would like to get in touch with, only then would the mother agency provide the addresses, no contact telephone numbers.

Then the exchange of letters between the male and female members would begin.

My second part of the research

Interviewing the men who resorted to pen-pal writing with a view to marriage should have been the second part of my research.

But as I had no access nor contacts to these bride seekers, I wrote to a few who advertised in the personals section, and who did not use pen-pal agencies.

Just like what I did in interviewing battered women, fortune tellers, and psychic healers.

From the personals section of a Manila newspaper with the highest circulation, I wrote to advertisers who did not use pen-pal agencies.

I wrote to one in New Zealand, one in Australia and two in the US.

As a photo was “required”, I enclosed what I thought was my best full-shot picture. It showed me wearing an emerald-colored, knee-length dress.

The Australian was the first to reply. His handwriting, however, put me off. Scrawled like the handwriting of a primary pupil, it was like interpreting hieroglyphics.

I did not write back. But he later sent two follow-ups apologizing for his initial letter. He said he was aboard an aircraft when he wrote it, hence, the child-like scrawl.

The two in the US both asked for additional photos: close-up and whole-body shots wearing something less conservative. Duh!

The one from New Zealand, let’s call him John (not his real name), had acceptable handwriting, exhibited good grammar, did not ask for more photos, and seemed to be a “perfect” research material.

John was divorced, in his late 40s, with three children, two of whom were already living independently. He did not require a lady half his age.

I wrote back and gave a brief description of my life and work. To make it short, we exchanged three letters each. In my third, I had to confess that I was not interested in a romantic relationship, that I was only doing research on men looking for “mail-order brides”.

I had to apologize, of course, if he felt duped by me.

He did not feel duped. I was just a number among his very broad selection of nearly a thousand females who wrote to him.

Meeting in real life

John was amused by it all. So much so that he shared with his mates that he had been used as a research material by this writer for her second romance novel.

They all had a good laugh over John’s experience, over a round of beer.

The journalist of the same newspaper, where I sourced the names of men advertising for Asian brides, was also amused when I related my research results.

She, the journalist, interviewed me and three of my colleagues writing for the same publisher about our next romance book projects.

The four had fun teasing me about my having done a flimflam on John.

Little did we — John and his mates at work in Auckland, and me and my colleagues in Manila — know that his request to meet me for coffee in Manila the following month, would end up at a civil registry office in New Zealand.

989 Letters and counting, and 12 women to meet in person

The next phase in Western men’s search for brides by pen-pal writing, after reading the letters and looking at the photos of the women, was choosing who to reply to.

John chose to correspond with 12 women in the Philippines. They lived in various cities in this country comprised of over 7,000 islands.

He asked me if I could meet him for coffee on the afternoon of his arrival. Just to say hello to each other, and perhaps laugh at my caper. After thinking it through, I thought, why not — if only to apologize in person.

We had coffee. There were no great shakes. I was in my writer’s mood and mode: curiously observing. I thought he was just an ordinary bloke looking for love.

The next day, he was off to meet 12 various pen-pals, one at a time. By car, by plane, by boat. He allotted two to three days for each city as he had to travel.

I remembered to include that stage in finding the best “mail-order bride” — an expensive journey for the bride-hunter.

Love letters galore

The offshoot of those meetings, which was akin to speed-dating in most recent times, was not a success. He went to my house — remember; he knew my address from the letters we exchanged — after his whirlwind trips were over. I was shocked, very shocked.

John had drunk too many. I would later learn that he was very nervous and did not know how to say what he wanted to tell me.

He said that after meeting me; he compared me to the rest of the 12 he had met. That I was heads above them all. And did he have my permission to keep on writing to me? He was flying back to Auckland the next day.

Having just about survived a really, really bad relationship, I was adamant. My writing career was tops on my agenda, not romance, not courting.

Just the same, he bombarded me with love letters as soon as he returned to New Zealand.

For the next seven months, I received lengthy letters three to four times a week. Most were 8–10 pages long; some 17 and the longest were 23 pages.

The romantic in me and the romance novelist in me melted, eventually.

On the eighth month, he flew to Manila. We got engaged. I introduced him to the rest of my family and to friends.

Ten months after meeting him for coffee, his drunken disclosure that he liked me over all the others he met, and seven months of sending me love letters, I migrated to New Zealand, where John and I got married.

Romantic fantasies gone awry

The next few years flew by. He worked most days, often 14-16 hours a day. I worked at the university from Monday to Friday and did my writing for Philippine publications on weekends. He was like me, a workaholic, but then we had a big mortgage on the property we bought.

I couldn’t say I was unhappy; neither could I claim I was miserable. I was focused on my day job and my career and John, on his job with unlimited overtime.

There was no time for us to properly know each other.

What I came to know, and some of this much later, was outside the box of my romance fantasies. He drank and drank a lot on his rare off-days. I did not drink alcohol except for the twice-yearly bubbly.

He gambled during his coffee breaks at work; he phoned the bookmaker to make his bets. I do not even know how to play bingo. The reason for his taking unlimited overtime work was to pay for his gambling habit.

When the company he worked for offered an attractive redundancy package, he took it. We were to fly to the Philippines to live permanently.

That suited me well. I would be with my family; I could focus on writing. My book-writing career was taking off, and I thought that John putting up a business in Manila would work better for our marriage.

A bonfire of anguish The contrary happened.

The death of my romantic dreams began when John burned the big box letters — mostly his, for me — in a bonfire.

I saw the flicker of embers from the back garden when I arrived home from work at dusk. I rushed to see what was burning.

There was John, feeding the bonfire with his love letters that snared my naïve belief that a man who wrote deeply felt words of love was a keeper.

“The box would only occupy space in our luggage,” he replied with nonchalance when I asked him why, “they’re just letters, anyway.”

Still dumbfounded, I felt hot tears running down my cheeks.

How could he be so insensitive to my feelings?

Or perhaps he really did not know me, just like I did not also know him after all.

Then I started to really know him as love died more and more, day by day.

The return to my home country could only be described as a disaster to our relationship.

His interests slammed me like a thunderbolt. He put up a business –a girlie nightclub — which I thought, at first, was an English-type pub. It was not. I was enraged, and that ate into my being like termites feasting on untreated wood.

Shortly after that, I started thinking of divorce.

The bonfire of my naïve illusion about romantic love burnt out in a huff, meeting its dreadful demise with arms wide open.

Update on this topic: The so-called mail-order bride industry, according to Dr. Frank McAndrew, is “alive and well in the 21st century” although the whole process is now done online. Think dating sites, for a start.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Romantic love exists; it will always exist. What would love and relationships be, especially in the beginning, without passion and hopeful anticipation?

And romance in a permanent relationship can be sustained for as long as the couple both work at it — with love, with respect, with fidelity. It must always be a two-way street.

To keep this kind of passion, the couple should, first of all, know each other very well. Remember that love alone is not enough.

The was my error. I got married without knowing the man and his undeclared traits, vice, and quirks.

This cheerless experience, however, did not discourage me from love, although my daughter had to push me to remain open to possibilities of finding love.

Sixteen years later, I married The One. We got to know each other very well first before tying the knot. I am happy, and so is he. We have no illusions, just a daily expectation of a continuing delightful future ahead.

And never again will there be a bonfire of love on the wane or in the throes, for me, for the two of us.

Romantic love is alive and well!

Thank you very much for reading.