From like to love in 40 years
● A chance meeting in Germany almost 40 years ago, rekindled in 2017 through social media, has culminated in Pearl Jacobs, 65, walking down the aisle with her “true love”.
Now Mrs Tolbert, she has just returned from a honeymoon in Mauritius with her American husband, Calvin.
Pearl, from Johannesburg, met Calvin at Frankfurt Airport in 1981 when she and her sister arrived in Germany for a holiday. He was a drill sergeant stationed there, on his way home to the US state of Georgia.
“I looked up and saw these beautiful ladies, Pearl caught my eye and we started conversing. We exchanged phone numbers and addresses,” Calvin said.
Pearl, a mother of three, was just “taking in the scenery when I saw this handsome hunk”.
They kept in touch for a couple of years, but then lost contact. Both married other people and then divorced. Calvin has two children.
“I prayed a lot that I would see him again. I did have men pursuing me, but I always knew I wanted this hunk,” Pearl said.
In 2017, 36 years since their first meeting, they separately joined Facebook for the first time.
“It’s so funny; we both had the urge to reunite on social media,” Pearl said.
“I looked up his name. There were so many people with the same name but when I saw him, I knew — that’s my man.
“I sent him a message: ‘Hi, we met a few years ago in Germany, I’m sorry if I have the wrong person.’ And almost as soon as I hit ‘send’ I got a message back: ‘Yes, it’s me. I was also looking for you.’
“He came to SA in 2018 and six months later we were engaged. It was always meant to be,” Pearl said.
The couple were married two weeks ago in Johannesburg, surrounded by friends and family. “Everyone was in tears, even my brothers,” Pearl said.
Both newlyweds are pensioners, “so the rest of our lives will be spent travelling between the US and Africa”, said Calvin. “The rest of our lives will be our honeymoon.”
People actually thought I was delusional because besides my sister who met Calvin, and my mother who spoke to him on the phone, nobody had seen him Pearl Tolbert