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Dawie Roodt is as respected and respectable as they come. Neat appearance with a short back and sides cut; lucrative job as chief economist and chairman of the Efficient Group; and impeccable taste in women - in his words, anyway.
Normally debating the second-round effects of the oil price in his day job as an economist, Roodt, 45, changes tack very quickly when he talks about his wife, Marina.
Or, to be clearer, his beautiful Russian bride fetched from the wide expanses of Siberia. Quite an accomplishment for the self-described "little boertjie".
It wasn't a mail-order scenario, he'll hastily tell you, but a wonderful example of how love can blossom over the internet.
Roodt's voice gets positively crackly when he talks about the woman he met in St Petersburg four years ago, her unbelievably blue eyes shielded by a pink umbrella.
"Those eyes," he oozes. "If you meet my wife you'll see what I mean - there's something very special about those eyes."
They met by chance when Roodt, also a television producer, was researching a documentary for kykNET on Russian brides.
He came across a photograph of Marina, a vet by profession, on a dating website and fell in love with "those eyes".
A year after meeting and corresponding from a distance, they tied the knot.
He'll wax lyrical, given a chance, about everything from the Russian church in Midrand to the similarities between Afrikaners and Russians.
They are both "very conservative" and tend to hold the same views about the traditional roles of women.
"I like the idea that they stay at home and look after the family," Roodt explains.
His relationship is but one example of the potential fairy-tale endings online romances can result in. Barely five or so years after it was acceptable to shriek in horror at the prospect of hunting for love online, the craze is now all the rage.
Whether you are a singleton in the city, gay, straight, a redhead with spiral curls, or have a penchant for swinging - there's an online site for you.
And what's more, the country's own "Dr Eve", Marlene Wasserman, gives online romance a thumbs-up, saying it's about time South Africans caught up with what has become a big phenomenon in the rest of the world.
In America especially, shrewd businessmen have made a mint off the industry and there is a plethora of DVDs, books and online guides available to instruct users in the ways of the web.
Wasserman says the mind-boggling variety of options has helped ease the stigma formerly attached to online dating - that only "loners or losers" should bother with it.
It simply isn't true - and trying it out can be a dizzingly romantic experience, too.
"It can be very flirty and intense and allows for a lot of sexual innuendo. The other advantage is that you get to test your social and sexual skills just by having a chat," says Wasserman.
On a more practical level, and at a time when crime rates have sent citizens reaching for the Trellidor, online dating also eliminates the need to go out alone at night, she says.
"People are busy during the day and many women are too afraid to go out alone at night. It's convenient to just go online."
Online dating also cuts out the need to spend money on boring dates, she adds. And those who do indulge in the wonderful world of cyberspace aren't labelled "desperate and crazy" anymore.
This was a taunt Greg Thompson suffered with pride at the height of his online romance several years ago.
South African by birth, Thompson, 37, met his Australian wife of four years, Anna-Greta, 35, in the chat room of sixdegrees.com, described by Wikipedia as the "original social network service".
Greg, a computer technician, remembers with a faraway voice how he used to burn the midnight oil in the office because of the time difference between Joburg and Sydney, waiting to chat with his online girlfriend.
"It started off as just a bit of fun chatting to this person on the other side of the world. We exchanged e-mail addresses and every morning I would have an e-mail from her. It was like having a pen pal."
The messages became routine - that is, at least, until Anna-Greta's mom took it upon herself to write to Greg, interrogating him on his intentions for her daughter. "She wanted to know what the hell was going on," he laughs. "She thought we should meet."
So they did. Anna-Greta travelled to South Africa in December 1999 and the two met for the first time at Cape Town International Airport. Greg wore a pre-arranged black outfit and held a rose.
The two then spent a glorious month together at Greg's brother's house in Cape Town.
"People thought I was nuts. Others thought I was desperate and crazy, which I probably was. My parents were very sceptical," he says.
Greg waited just two months before hopping on a plane to Sydney and the couple were married on May 25, 2002.
Wasserman says those who choose to surf the net for love need to bear the pitfalls in mind.
The most common complaint was the usual disillusionment people felt when they met their mate and the sparks failed to fly.
There was also a real danger in people misrepresenting themselves on their profiles.
Yet another danger is that the fad can consume you. Normal dating fades away and your relations with the opposite sex become dysfunctional.
"It can become your whole world. It is concerning that it really is so encompassing. It almost becomes your calling card and can become quite obsessive," Wasserman says.
She advises online punters to look up the object of their affections on Google. It can do no harm and can certainly throw up any dark secrets he or she might have stashed in the closet. It is also a good idea to meet in public for the first time.
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