I was checking many of the singles sites on the Internet, looking for the perfect woman. I had some reasonably good pictures of myself and put together a good profile and introduction letter. Over the course of many months, I looked at hundreds of photographs and profiles, and sent my introduction letter to something like 70 ladies. Out of all of those, I had only recieved two responses. One was just telling me she wasn't interested. The other fizzled out after two or three email exchanges.But during my search, I had seen profiles of some very lovely women, who gave a description of themselves that matched almost perfectly what I was looking for. Only one problem -- they weren't local. In fact, they were from Eastern Europe. So I just skipped over them. For a while.
But I was getting interested, and did some research. I found several web sites and mailing lists devoted to men who are interested in women from the former Soviet Union (FSU) countries. I learned a lot from these, but didn't pursue it beyond locating some agency sites and looking over some of the women.
About a year later, some of my circumstances changed, and I decided to look into these women from the FSU again. I felt led to concentrate on Ukraine, and one agency in particular really stuck out. I searched this agency's web site and ended up with a list of about 30 ladies that I was interested in. Not wanting to go completely crazy with this, I chose seven and sent an introduction letter to them in late March to early April of 2001. I figured if none of them responded, I would try a few more at a time. But out of that first seven, three of them responded! For a guy who only received one reply from 70 letters before, this was a completely unexpected result!
I corresponded with one lady named Natalia for about a month and decided she wasn't the right woman for me. Another one, Tatyana, seemed perfect, and we corresponded for about two months. She was a little younger than I was really looking for, but we had a lot in common, similar goals and dreams, and we were both Christians. But that one just didn't quite work out. There were some misunderstandings and some other circumstances that got in the way, so it ended up going nowhere.
Iryna was also one of the three. In fact, she was the first to reply to my letter. We seemed to connect right from the start. We slowly but steadily grew closer, and opened up more to each other. My relationship with Iryna didn't develop as fast as it did with Tatyana, but while I was having troubles with Tatyana, Iryna was constant. She was caring, romantic, trusting, and pragmatic. She accepted me for who I was, taking my faults and problems as simply aspects of what made me who I am. Iryna and I continued to get closer, like each other more, and open up more. And we discovered that we had a lot in common.
I decided to go to Vinnitsa, Ukraine and see how well we would get along in person. I arrived on June 30, 2001. Iryna and I immediately hit it off. It seemed like we fit together perfectly. We spent quite a bit of time together, getting to know each other. I had considered the possibility of coming home from this trip engaged, but I did not really expect that to happen. But on Thursday July 12, 2001, I proposed to Iryna. She thought about it, asked me a lot of questions, and drove me crazy waiting. Finally, on Sunday July 15, three days after I proposed, and the day before I was to leave, she said yes, she would marry me!