How Do A Foreign Affair Socials/Tours Really Work??
By John Adams
For those of you who do not know me, my name is John Adams, President and CEO of A Foreign Affair. Since 1995, AFA has been dedicated to assisting men and women from around the world to come together for serious relationships and marriage. I was lucky enough to meet my wife Tanya at an AFA social in St. Petersburg Russia in 1997, and in that time, I have seen a lot of changes, some good, some not so good, but in all that time we have never lost sight of our commitment to excellence.
I would like to reinforce what our tours and socials are all about. We have been conducting them since 1995 and they have been well documented by such networks as MTV, WETV, The Oprah Winfrey Network, NIGHTLINE, etc. Even after us conducting well over 2,000 successful socials, there still seems to be some confusion as to how they really work and what really goes on. One reason for the confusion is the very internet that has helped to change and shape the industry over the years. The internet can be a great source of information, however, it can also be akin to the proverbial "bathroom wall" where anybody and everybody can write whatever they want with little regard to the truth. Whenever researching anything you always have to consider the source of the information and ask yourself if its objective or not? Is it coming from a respected source, someone with an axe to grind, or possibly a competitor trying to build his or her business by criticizing the leader in the industry? This advice holds true no matter what you are searching for, whether it be a singles tour or an internet provider, you must use good judgment when searching for information on the net. To that end, I am going to do my best to dispel any myths or half-truths that may be floating around about our tours or socials. If you have questions or doubts, call us and talk about it. Ask to speak to references who have been on our tours and will gladly answer any questions you may have.
Before getting to the points below, I want to make one issue clear. I have the utmost respect for the women who attend our socials and have attended our socials over the years. It isn't easy for them. There are stigmas they have to overcome. Whenever you do anything outside the box, people will criticize you. My wife attended one of our socials and I am extremely grateful that she did! These are women who come to the socials with aspirations, the hope of finding that one special person. It is not an easy thing and obviously it doesn't always happen for them, but they have the courage to do whatever it takes to find that special person. Every once in a while, I will see other sites attempting to degrade the women for attending socials in an attempt to try and build their business, and I think that is unfortunate. These remarkable women deserve much better.
Do you screen the women who attend the socials? Yes. We do screen both the men and the women who attend the socials, we always have from the very beginning and we always will. Does this mean that we give them a battery of physiological and psychological tests, subject them to lie detectors, professional investigators etc. etc - No! Thankfully, I know of no other company that does that type of screening, sounds a bit demeaning doesn't it??
First, it is AFA policy that a woman be a member of AFA prior to attending a social. In order to be a member, the women must show Identification proving she is who she says she is. Secondly, The women must complete a lengthy questionnaire that asks many questions with respect to their intentions and mind set. This is important as we are seeking both men and women who truly have an interest in meeting someone for a serious relationship which may lead to marriage.
Thirdly, we have over 19 offices around the world in the cities in which we conduct the tours. Our office staff knows the vast majority if not all the women on a personal basis. For instance, recently I had a client who was going to Costa Rica and had questions about 5 women he wanted to meet. I called Gustavo, the office manager in San Jose, and we did a 3-way call with the client and Gustavo . He knew just about anything and everything you would want to know about each woman the client was interested in. If that is not personal screening, (not to mention great personal service before the tour!) I don't know what is. This is a very personal business, our people work very closely with these women to help them with their search, thus they get to know them very well, and can share that information with you the client, in hopes of helping to make a mutually strong connection.
If we later discover that a woman misled us or acted in an unethical manner then we deal with the situation, normally by removing the profile from the service. This doesn't happen very often but when you have 40,000, or even 40, people doing any one thing you will always have people with different agendas.
Are the men screened? Yes. In order to attend a tour, or even a social, the men must complete a criminal/marital background form. We also perform a sex offender check on the men using the National Sex Offender Data Base. We translate and give all this information to the women so they have a better idea of the background of the men. The men also complete a profile form that gives us a better idea of what their intentions are. I have been doing this since 1995 and I have a great respect for the men who use our service. They are virtually all looking for serious relationships and marriage. Some have not dated in a while and it is wonderful to see them come alive again and get excited about buying flowers for the women and meeting the parents and family etc. I am proud to have been associated with the thousands of men we have assisted in the past and look forward to doing the same in the future.
Have you ever not allowed a client to attend your Tour/Socials? Yes. We have been in business since 1995 and in that time we have dealt with thousands of men. Again, the vast majority were and still are wonderful gentlemen who truly desire to meet the woman of their dreams. However, every once in a while you will have men who are just not suited for our tours for various reasons. When that occurs, we simply refuse service. Again, it is our intent to create an environment where men and women feel safe and are like minded in their quest to meet that one special person. If a man has a different agenda or has demonstrated behavior that we feel is inappropriate, we simply decline to offer him service.
How do you invite the women to your socials? Actually, you the client are largely responsible for inviting the women to the socials. We request that the clients on a particular tour send us a list of ID numbers of women they would like to meet and we do our best to either invite those women to the socials or set up one-on-one introductions. Our staff works for months calling and inviting the women based on the lists we receive from the clients and also the demographics of the group. In some cities we will have an opportunity for the men to meet women who are joining AFA for the very first time, this is normally done prior to the social event. These women are responding to advertising or literature letting them know that they have the opportunity to meet foreign men. The men are encouraged to attend this event as well and get to know these women as this is the first ever experience most have ever had with meeting foreign men. After the women have completed all of their forms and officially joined AFA, some may be invited to the social as well.
What are my opportunities to meet women during a tour? You will have many opportunities to meet a wide variety of women during your tour. Again, we have been conducting these tours since 1995 and we have developed the best possible ways to utilize your time to make it as efficient and effective as possible to meet the most eligible women. The Socials are an excellent way to meet women that you want to meet and women who were never on your radar screen. The Social environment allows you to screen women and women to screen you very quickly to see if there is any kind of a connection. Once that is established, you can spend more time enjoying one-on-one dates and getting to know each other better. On the other hand, there will be some women you wanted to meet at the social and once you meet them, you understand that there is no mutual chemistry, which is fine, because you can easily move on. A social is just one tool that we use to introduce you to as many likeminded women as possible. There is also the new applicant interview that we hold in many of our tour cities, where you have the opportunity to meet the brand new applicants who are not even on the internet yet. This is a great opportunity; we have seen many marriages occur through this option. We also have a full office staff at your disposal the entire duration of your tour. Their goal is to assist you in meeting as many different women as possible, and of course, assisting with any logistical needs you may have. They are constantly calling the women you are interested in and arranging one-on-one dates. Whether the woman attends the social doesn't matter; their mission is to assist you in meeting the women you want to meet. They are also great counselors and advisers. These people have years of experience and they will listen to you and give you their thoughts as they relate to the specific situations you encounter. Of course the final choices will be up to you to decide, but it is nice to have competent advice from experts in the field.
Why do you go to multiple cities on one tour? Not all of our tours go to multiple cities. Actually, many will be held in one city and we do multiple socials in that one city with different women attending each social. However, on some of our tours, especially in the Ukraine, they do go to two or even three cities during one 11 or 12 day tour (there are opportunities to combine tours that are scheduled back to back in our other locations which will result in visiting multiple cities for Latin America and Asia on an extended tour. Many clients do take advantage of this option for the greater exposure it affords them) These tours are designed to be longer to allow for the extra travel. There are many reasons for this, but the main reason is opportunity. We want to give every opportunity to meet as many different women as possible. Many men are writing or interested in women from multiple cities that are close enough to easily visit. For example, our Odessa tour includes Nikolaev and Kherson. A taxi between Odessa and Nikolaev is only about 3 hours. A taxi between Nikolaev and Kherson is only one hour. If you are going to travel half-way around the world, why wouldn't you give yourself every opportunity to meet as many women as possible? Many of our clients will go back to a certain city during a tour and spend more time getting to know the woman or women they are most interested in. That is never a problem, as we have offices and full support in all the cities in which we do the socials. Even if we were to stay in Kiev, for instance, for the entire tour, if you met one woman from Kiev who lived on the opposite side of town, it could still easily take you an hour to almost 2 hours in heavy traffic to drive to her house to meet with her. So by going to these different cities, the time it takes to get back and forth is really inconsequential compared to your opportunity to meet new and different women. There are differences in culture and in the women even from city to city. For instance, women from Kiev are somewhat different from women from Poltava. Some cities are larger, some smaller, some more rural, some more cosmopolitan. Just think of the US and compare New York to Boise; the women, and men for that matter, are different. By having the opportunity to visit multiple cities on any one tour, you have the benefit of experiencing a much broader base of interested women. The experience of going to these different cities is also very rewarding in and of itself. Very few men are ever going to experience some of the small cities we go to such as Sumy or Poltava. The tours are about meeting that one special person. You can then build the relationship after you have established that you have a mutual chemistry, but the most important part of all is that first meeting, and that is why we work so hard at giving you every opportunity to meet as many different women as possible. Yes, it is more expensive for us to do this, and we could easily just stay in one city. However, it is our goal to give you the best experience possible and the best chance for success possible. We feel that in the Ukraine, due to the close proximity of these cities, it just makes sense.
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