Re: Carol McLane & The SAPE organization

Thanks for the support you offered. I'll give you some general information
about the origins of the organization and guidelines (some of this was posted
previously which prompted Ms. McLane's post).

Unfortunately, I am only (personally) trying out America Online on a trial
basis and my account will close probably next week when my 10 free hours are
used up. The organization itself has no email address. There hadn't much
need for one since so few kids in the former USSR even have access to
computers and the internet. All the penpals we match are pen and paper
penpals, rather than email penpals. When we get an official and permanent
email address for the organization, I'll post the information here (and we
will probably also have a webpage in the future). As for posting my
telephone number, since this whole thing is run by a small band of volunteers
and myself out of my home, I really hesitate to post my home telephone number
on the internet. I think you can understand that. It's really best to send
any questions in writing to me at the P.O. Box address.

I started SAPE in May, 1989 with my own Russian penpal, Marina Prokhorova of
Chelyabinsk. We had already been corresponding for 10 years and had the idea
since the beginning of our friendship. We never thought it could happen
until Gorbachev came into the picture and changes started happening. We
wrote to some (then) Soviet newspapers and in August, 1989, "Pionerskaya
Pravda" (which coincidentally enough was the national scouting publication)
printed our letter. Soon after that I started receiving THOUSANDS of letters
from the former USSR. Since that time, it has snowballed on the other side
of the ocean with very little additional pushing from either of us! The
word-of-mouth system is so entrenched over there that our address just spread
to all corners of the Soviet Union.

So besides matching the penpals, most of my job has consisted of trying to
drum up enough interest here in the USA and to make the project financially
self-sufficient. In the beginning I tried to do it all without charging any
fee, but quickly realized that I would go broke just trying to contact
schools to get them interested. The fee has stayed at $3.00 per penpal for
the past 2 years and that seems to be enough to cover the expenses but not so
high that people are dissuaded from participating. You should know that
everyone involved in this does so in his or her spare time. There are no
paid employees.

Each person who is interested should fill out the order form below. Send
forms with check or money order (no cash please) for the total amount ($3.00
per penpal) to:
SAPE
P.O. Box 251689
Glendale, CA 90039-1689

First & Last Name: __________________________________

Street Address: ________________________________________

City: ______________________________

State: __________ Zip: ________________________

Sex: ________________ Age: _________________

Languages Known: ___________________________________
I want to write to a:
male _________ female __________ No Preference __________

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