ON A FROSTY JANUARY AFTERNOON, Lis Daugaard’s tummy fluttered as she waited in arrivals at the Copenhagen airport. Dressed in her best, the 65-year-old searched among the disembarking passengers for Robert Aleksander’s face.
They had met on a dating site and, after two months of exchanging emails and phone calls, this would be their first real-life encounter.
After the crowd thinned to nothing, Lis still stood there waiting. Where was the man from the photographs—grey-haired, handsome, with a shy smile? On her way home, the tears began to flow. “I had to call my daughter and say: ‘I think I’ve made a big mistake,’” she says.
Lis’s romance began on a popular Danish site, dating.dk, shortly after she retired back in 2013. Her husband had died 10 years earlier and until now she had been too busy raising four kids and pursuing an international career with the Chamber of Industry and Commerce in Leipzig, Germany, (living on the Continent for some years) to look for love. When she posted her profile, Robert Aleksander—who claimed to be an EU diplomat— pinged into her inbox almost immediately.
As the relationship blossomed, his emails became increasingly romantic. So when he said he needed a loan for travel, Lis didn’t hesitate. She wired him her savings of 94,000 krone (more than 10 lakhs), including the cost for a visit to her in Copenhagen. Now, when he failed to arrive, Lis was stunned. “How could a woman of my background, working all over Europe, get taken in like this?” she asks.
Police are worried about cases like Lis’s because many are carried out by international, organized crime gangs, operating behind the shield of a computer in Nigeria, Malaysia or Israel, far beyond the reach of local law enforcement. The Danish force issued a stark public warning, as have forces in Germany, France, Canada and the US. “The person you are communicating with is not necessarily the person they say they are,” Danish police told hopeful daters.
This story is from the December 2018 edition of Reader's Digest India.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the December 2018 edition of Reader's Digest India.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 9,000+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
From the King's Table to Street Food: A Food History of Delhi
Pushpesh Pant, one of India’s pre-eminent food writers, is back with a comprehensive food history of the capital.
Who Wants Coffee?
It’s bitter—but beloved around the world
Prevent The Pain Of Shingles
You don't have to suffer, as long as you take two important steps
The Best And Worst Diets For Your Heart
Dozens of diets are touted as ‘best’, but it’s easy to lose track of the fact that healthy eating needs to be about overall wellness, not just weight loss.
ME & MY SHELF
Journalist Sopan Joshi has worked in a science and environment framework for nearly three decades. His book Mangifera indica: A Biography of the Mango (Aleph Book Company) synthesizes the sensory appeal of India's favourite fruit with its elaborate cultural roots and natural history. He writes in English and Hindi.
SWITCHED
In 1962, nurses at a small Canadian hospital sent home two women with the wrong babies. Then, 50 years later, their children discovered the shocking mistake.
ECHOES OF THE PAST
A VISIT TO THE ANCIENT BARABAR CAVES IN BIHAR REVEALS A SURPRISING CONNECTION TO A LITERARY CLASSIC
Fathers of the Bride
A young woman finds a unique way to honour the many men who helped her survive her childhood
Fiction's Foresight
British-Bangladeshi author Manzu Islam's works reveal startling parallels to recent political upheavals in Bangladesh, begging the question: Besides helping us make sense of our world, can stories also offer a glimpse into the future?
It Happens ONLY IN INDIA
The Divine Defence Picture this: A tractor in Rajasthan‘s Banswara district,a group of loan agents closing in to seize it and the defaulting farmer and his family standing by.
