The pilot and the poet. The pen pals.

At 13.45pm today BBC Radio 4 will broadcast Pen Pals. It's a series celebrating the phenomenon of the international pen pal.  When the producer approached me a year ago I chose my penpal, a pilot from Ethiopian Airlines. My father was a pilot for Ethiopian Airlines. He died in a plane crash in the  early 1970's. I love Ethiopian Airlines.  I flew with Ethiopian only last week.  It was a kind of miracle that my pen pal would be the pilot of this plane crash in 1996.  His name is Captain Yonas Mekuriahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WE2Yn0cipTYIncredible. Right?   With all the permissions from Ethiopian Airlines in place   I wrote my first Airmail letter (yes I know "Airmail" to a pilot.  an air male). And then I waited and waited... and waited.  Nothing.  Meanwhile  I was visiting Addis for some work unconnected to this.    I received a message from the concierge. “Captain Yonas  is here to see you.”   I called my producer to let her know the bizarre situation of watiing for a letter and yet getting a call to meet the person.Meeting was not on the cards.  I took the lift and met Captain Yonas Mekuria for a coffee in the bar of The Hilton Hotel. After a long conversation it became obvious to me that this (our pen pal relationship)  wasn’t going to happen.  I realised that our pilots (he is a national treasure after all) have a busy workload.  What a fascinating man he is though!  I returned to England dejected. My dream was dashed, hijacked and then crashed into the sea.  The deadlines had all passed too.  So without a pilot and without Ethiopian Airlines I turned to another favourite country of mine and a boy who saved the day: A hero. To find out more  listen on BBC Radio four in  minutes.  . It will be available to listen online for the next seven days.