Hey Guys,
I finally have had a few days to decompress and think about how I want to approach this trip report as a way to show the progression that I made from novice to still somewhat a novice but with a better head for how to go through the LTP program. I do however want to make a few comments:
1. As many of you had read my trip report from my first trip, it was extremely comprehensive and detailed. I am going to leave it up to you all whether you want another detailed trip report with all the details, or if you would prefer a more general assessment of my 32 days in Tver.
2. For this trip, I am not going to use last names unless necessary. You may email me directly if you wish more detailed info offline.
3. Although I matched on this trip, I want to be upfront that not all of my experiences were positive so this will be an honest assessment of the LTP program as a client who went through the program a 2nd time.
4. Finally, I want to say that my experiences are extremely abnormal for a man going through the LTP program. I basically spent a total of 2 of the last 4 months in Tver looking for the woman I wished to marry. Most men get 10 -14 days to look for a wife in Tver so you can not honestly look at my approach as a guide for how to be successful in the LTP program.
Pre-Trip Preparations and My Mindset:
Since I was just in Tver in March and April, I only had about 2 months to gain some perspective and try to see where I could improve on my approach to finding my true lifetime partner in Tver. I knew that I made some errors which were helpful in making sure that I would hopefully be more successful. I also knew that I spent way too much time focusing on the young pretty girls and not enough on who would actually make the best wife for me. Since I had already asked Marina to marry me and come to the States and she told me that she was "not ready," I began to focus on 3 girls from my first trip that I thought would be good complements to me, as well as about 10-15 new girls that were older, some with children, but ones that might be more motivated in the program. I knew that what had happened to me in March and April with the lack of success actually was a blessing in disguise because I had dated many young hotties and had "gotten it out of my system" so to speak prior to my return and had a better idea of what I was looking for in a future wife.
I was determined to go about this trip differently, using the advice that others on this board had suggested and try to narrow down my choices and "converse in reverse" as Witchdoc puts it to see just who was interested in me as a future husband. I did not want to waste time pursuing girls that had no interest or just wanted to date and have fun. I was not going over to Russia to date, since I could date here and not have the attachments, but rather find a woman that I wanted to marry and bring to the States. I learned from Marina that I needed to quickly determine the woman's interest and then proceed to see who showed interest in me. I was going to be "power Thomas;" in essence looking at this trip as a business trip with the mindset of finding the woman who would make me happy. From my experience in the computer and high-tech industry, I had become comfortable with exuding confidence and a little arrogance when I would be meeting with engineers and managers, so I thought that having this mindset should translate to this process as well.
Zhanna, Oksana and Valeria were women that I had continually kept correspondence with to see who would follow up with my letters after we had met on my 1st trip. Although correspndence can serve a very useful purpose, there is also the risk of misunderstandings and communications because of the lack of context and meaning when words are being translated from one language to another. I really was interested in both Oksana and Valeria and knew that on this trip I would quickly find out where their feelings were for me so that I knew right away whether I would be going to my secondary wishlist for possible matches. Oksana and I had writeen to each other a lot during this 2 months which showed me that she was interested in me, or at least wanted to practice her English with me since she was translating the letters herself. We had several misunderstandings that I was not sure about, so I was hoping that we could meet the first night or so to clear these up and see where our relationship (if we even had one) stood. Valeria was very busy with work and school so she did not write hardly at all. Now, Oksana also worked and went to school but seemed to be able to write to me often, so I thought Valeria might be on the fence about me. Zhanna was an interpreter in the office who I really liked and had become very interested in because we had similar interests, great chemistry, and a strong physical attraction; however, she had not written me so I was not sure whether she was interested in me. I wanted to know right away about these three girls, so I asked my interpreters Natasha and Helen to schedule these women in the first couple of days so I would know how to proceed.
I should also mention that Sean the cameraman would be arriving 2 weeks into my trip to film whatever happened with me prior to his arrival. Since the story that was being filmed about my search for a Russian woman was incomplete, Sean wanted to come back and try to see if I matched on this trip, although another client was going to be filmed in case I didn't match. To me, the story was secondary to this search, since we are talking about the rest of my life and my happiness. I wanted to follow through on my commitment to Witchdoc and KPIX, but I think they also understood that this was by no means a slam-dunk in filming me matching with a woman from Tver. There was no guarantee that I would match on thsi trip, and as others have noted on this baord, some have taken many, many trips without success. I understood the need for a backup in case things did not work for me for the story, but I was confident that I had understood better how to approach this endeavor. Although there were some on this board (you know who you are) who were still skeptical of me and what my mindset was like as I left for Tver, I thought that I had the right mind prior to arriving in Tver. I had 3 solid girls from my 1st trip to meet, then about 10-15 girls that were new to me that were hopefully more motivated in finding a husband.
Since Aeroflot has been discussed before in my trip report, as well as many others, I will skip this part of my trip and begin the Russia portion of my trip report in earnest over the weekend; although I do want to know if you all want a detailed and comprehensive report or a short synopsis.
