Pen pals of 47 years go from letters to daily updates

A Cork woman had told how her pen pal friendship, which has lasted almost half a century, has changed with time from old-fashioned letters to instant social media posts.

Macroom mother of two Esther Truslove has been writing to Rita Gauci from Malta for almost five decades after seeing an advertisement for penpals in a Jackie magazine when she was just 12.

While she went to Malta to meet her pal for the first time in 1980 for Rita’s wedding, she was overjoyed when her penpal finally made the return journey and came to Ireland to visit her last week after 47 years of correspondence.