From Online to Face-to-Face:
Not all of my efforts to become "more than just internet friends" have failed, though. Eventually we all learned about Skype and we were finally hearing each other's voices, chatting in real time. And yes, if we had had this a year earlier life would have been far more pleasant... but alas, it's best we learn than repeat. So we did continue to inch closer and closer to knowing each other better and better (on top of a couple more years of MSN chats and myOtaku blogs).
One summer while visiting family, I dashed away for an afternoon to meet a different myOtaku friend. I met her at a mall and met her alone - not the ideal plan, really (picking a public place to meet worked out well, though). Thankfully for us the faces before us matched the pictures, as did the voices. And yeah, we had a great day that day... and when my aunt picked me up, I got an earful about how dangerous it all was... yeah... again, I go back to the whole "3 years of pretending to be someone else is generally not worth it" rationale.
The following year I'd go on to meet a few more myOtaku friends. One came to my town, meeting me at a train station and coming with his sister (public place, didn't come alone - good work) and we had a good few hours; later on I even met the rest of his family that was all squished into a van in a parking lot. By the end of the afternoon I knew I was in a safe situation, he and his sister knew they were in a safe situation, and his whole family knew that he was in a safe situation. If you're not trying to hide anything, then don't hide anything; let your friends be known, let yourself be known, and good things will happen... like, they'll let you stay at their house if you get stranded in their city one night due to an airport mix-up a couple years down the road (true story, too).
Another time I went to another friend; flew down for her wedding. I guess that's the first thing, that she was older, was a mature adult. Second thing was that she had told everyone - her fiancé, her family, her friends - about me. So when they met this strange little Asian-Canadian fellow slowly learning their accent, they welcomed me with open arms, allowed me to play around in the yard with their kids, didn't worry when I was staying in their (or their daughter or sister's) home.
So this wedding thing... really, I was the one more at risk than anyone else. I was flying alone to another country, was relying on someone I had never met in person to accommodate me for half a week. How do you rationalise this kind of risk? Again, the years of chatting help, as did the actual wedding invitation I received in the mail - not saying that it could have been faked, but it was at least consistent with the story. The fact we're all adults is definitely a good thing. The fact that all parties were well informed on both sides (my stepdad helped me book my flight, after all, so my parents must have been able to trust my judgement). As for her, well... it was her home town, her car, she met me at the airport with a different myO friend of ours... she also possibly had a .357 revolver somewhere, though that's just another thing for me to worry about. Actually, considering I know she owns a .357 revolver perhaps says instead that she told me these things so there were no secrets... yeah, I like that idea...
I could probably go into even further detail with the European myO friends I visited a different year, but suffice to say that many years have passed, many gifts have been exchanged, and a great deal of correspondence has led to a good amount of trust between us all. As well, our families all know about us well enough (which is why I was able to stay with said-families once I was over there). So the best I can say is that communication and telling your parents and family members about your online friends is always better than not.
