Well, you might have noticed, that since about March I only uploaded one proper drawing, and a few non-furry things for my friends’ birthdays. Now I’ve never been a super productive artist, but this is poor, even by my standards. Well there are two reasons for that, and one is that I’m working on a drawing that has turned in a bit of a big project, and the other more important reason is that I’ve had very little drawing time since March. And that is because of my new love.

Flashback time! All the way back in 2000, I went on a 2 week holiday to Indonesia. That happened to be at a time when schools in Indonesia were closed for a holiday too. And you know, how we in the West we often find Asian people attractive, because they look a bit exotic, in the sense that they are a bit less common than (speaking from the NL) common white people. Well, in Asia, this is the other way around. Even stronger, because white people there are more rare than Asian people in the West. And for me the effect was even stronger, because most white tourists and ppl in Asia, are pensioners, while I was 17.
So quite a few times, I found myself surrounded by a high school class that was on a school trip, trying their best English on me, and I gave out my email address to them countless times. Two of those girls actually emailed me. With one of them, the emails stopped after a few months. But the other girl, our pen friendship continued for 6-7 years! But then, gradually, the emails stopped too.

Last March, however, I had the thought to send her an email again. So I did. And ever since then, well, things started to bloom.

Then you might wonder, why I never mentioned her before (aside for some cryptic mentions between the lines?) Well, I had a good reason for that. You see, back in March, she was still married, to a rather abusive husband, and I didn’t want to risk him finding out about me. Throw in the mix that she has a young child (about 1 year old) and that her ex saw that as a convenient way to put her under pressure… Well let’s just say I didn’t want to find out how he would react if he found out about me.
But, with my encouragement and support she found the courage and endurance to ask her family for help and go to court and get officially divorced, with custody over her child. And a few weeks ago, and 10 million rupiah (1100 USD) lighter, finally she was able to give her ex the official document stating that they were divorced.

I am SO proud of her When I ‘found’ her back in March, she was deeply unhappy, didn’t see any way out and she was even afraid to tell her parents what was going on, because divorce in her culture is quite a loss of face for the whole family, and her ex wanted her to keep quiet towards her parents too. But despite how impossible things looked back then, she has won the struggle (and a struggle it was!) and today she is a free woman again!!

So next week, I’m going to go to Indonesia for 2 weeks, to meet her, and her little one. An internet relationship is a very different one from real life, but we’ve shared so much by now, that I really want to know where this relationship can take us. Guess this also means I’m going to celebrate x-mas and new years in the blistering sun!

Oh, I can’t wait to close this woman in my arms after all this time…!