what's the point of this type of mail, what do they hope to achieve?

My name is Maria. I am looking for a new friend.
Write me at : xxxxxxx@gmail.com

Verification of a live email address and then sell it to lots of other companies….one reply = spamtastic!

SSP

If you find yourself with spare time, you should just spam them back!

Go to London Gumtree and sign them up for ALL the E-Mail updates and send it to them a few times.

They'll get a few hundred emails every day until they un-subscribe

They won't care. It's not a real person at the other end, its just software.