Richard Gleeson
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (July 20/01) - After almost two decades of sending letters and e-mails across the Atlantic, Lynn Wilke and Christer Goransson have finally met.

In front of the place that brought them together, Lynn Wilke and Christer Goransson met for the first time last week after 19 years of being pen pals. - Richard Gleeson/NNSL photo

A lot of water has passed under the bridge for both since Wilke, then a grade-schooler living in Lynn Lake, Man., responded to a letter from Goransson.

Tracing the latitude of his home town of Kalmar, in southeast Sweden, across an ocean and into Canada, Goransson's finger stopped at Lynn Lake. He sent a general-delivery letter asking for pen pals. The post office sent the letter to Lynn Lake's only school in town.

"Being 13-year-old girls getting a letter from this older boy in Sweden with blond hair and blue eyes, we were like, 'Let's write him!'" recalled Wilke, now 32. Goransson remembered that four students wrote back. His correspondence with Wilke -- 19 years in duration -- has, by far, been the most lasting.

"In the beginning it was normal letters," he said. "It took almost two weeks for a letter to arrive."

The two continued relying on mail service until 1998 when they switched to that e-mail. They also phoned and exchanged photos.

Through postcards sent during his extensive travels, Goransson provided Wilke with a glimpse of Europe.

"He surprised me in January when he said he was coming to visit," said Wilke.

It was an exhausting trip. In addition to 13 hours of flying from his present home in Switzerland to Yellowknife, Goransson had to cope with an eight-hour time difference.

"I've been spoiled with gifts from Sweden and so has my family," said Wilke.

Last Tuesday, Wilke introduced Goransson to the charms of the Gold Range.

"It was a very special place, that I can say," said Goransson. "The band was very good."

As lasting as it is, the relationship is not heading toward anything more or less serious than friends, the two said. That's despite some pressure Wilke was feeling from her family.

"The first thing out of their mouths when they found out he was going to come here was 'You never know," said Wilke.

The two spent last weekend at a camp Wilke's father has on the other side of Yellowknife Bay. They will be exploring the South Slave later this week.