Love Stories: Told by you

Now it’s your turn to share. A bonus episode to end our Love Stories series where you tell the world how your true love grew.

Fiona Smiley Wright got in touch about an extraordinary romance that was hiding right under her nose for most of her life, growing up in Northern Ireland. It wasn’t until her parents passed away that Fiona and her three brothers discovered years of love letters between them, while separated by war. Fiona tells Asya the tale of a silver cigarette box that her mother Elizabeth gifted to her father Tom, a surgeon, before he departed for Singapore during World War Two, and how it was crucial in ensuring their love survived.

In the summer of 1983, Hana Keplova, a talented singer studying at Prague University, stayed in a family home in England en route to taking part in a choral festival. Over breakfast she meets Andrew Johnson, the twinkly-eyed son of her host family. The two became pen pals and Andrew made a surprise visit to the then-communist state of Czechoslovakia, and kept on coming back. After encounters with secret police and heated debates on long walks in the countryside, the pair slowly fell in love. They married in 1989, the same year the Iron Curtain fell. Hana and Andrew now reflect on their love story together.

Dutch maths teachers Bart Zevenhek and Nieky Liesker were both single and disillusioned with love. But on Valentine’s Day in 2000, a practical joke set up by their students planted a seed that blossomed into romance. They join us from their forest house in Amsterdam to recount the tale.

Soulmates Karo Caran and Victor Tsaran grew up in neighbouring countries, Poland and Ukraine. It wasn’t their shared border that brought them together, but their individual hopes of learning how to use a computer. They tell Asya how, in the mid-90s, they met and fell in love on a year-long computer course for blind and visually-impaired students in the US. After returning to their respective homes and posting audio letters on floppy disks to each other, they moved to America together. They've worked at NGOs supporting computer education for blind people and today live and work in the heart of Silicon Valley.

Presenter: Asya Fouks
Producer: Elena Angelides, Edgar Maddicott and Vibeke Venema

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Lives Less Ordinary is a podcast from the BBC World Service that brings you the most incredible true stories from around the world. Each episode a guest shares their most dramatic, moving, personal story. Listen for unbelievable twists, mysteries uncovered, and inspiring journeys - spanning the entire human experience. Step into someone else’s life and expect the unexpected.