Around the world

1117 - From Danielle, a picture by Wendy Burke, 'Cat on Lap'.

Does anyone know what machine this girl is operating?

I looked it up - she's a linotyper in a publishing house.  Are you any the wiser?  I'm not.

1118 - From Jorma in Finland a postcrossing card (FI-1936567) , views of Finland's 11th largest city, Pori.

And my first Finland 2013 postcrossing stamp -

1119 - Another postcrossing card (FR-333861) - this one is from Karen.

I already have a number of views of Marseille but not this one so it is a welcome addition.

These three cards all arrived on 27th November 2013.

Fairy tales and cheese.

1115 - Veronika from Russia sent me this postcrossing card (RU-2166217) which arrived on 26^th November. It looks like the sort of picture found in old fairy tales books.

 I'm not sure who the artist is - perhaps some Russian speaker could enlighten me?

1116 – A wonderful selection of cheeses on this postcrossing card from Johanna in Germany (DE-2667852). If you want to see the individual cheeses you can click on the picture to enlarge it.

 

The Marigold is quite a common card on German cards and I’ve seen the Tulip before but this is the first time I’ve seen the lovely Lily-of-the-Valley stamp.

Skipping forward...

The only way I stand a chance of getting up-to-date is to skip forward from 1002 to 1111 which was one of yesterday’s cards.

1111 – Monica in Sweden made this card, received 25^th November 2013, from her own photos.   Or perhaps, arguably, it’s a photo not a card but since it has a message on the back and is certainly worth blogging I’m counting it.  It’s a lot clearer and more attractive than many a postcard you buy in the shops. 

The envelope it came in contained other things and the stamps were fantastic.  So much wildlife…

 

1112 – Another  card from Monica, this is one of the Lennart Helje cards.  It’s called Snårlvinter which doesn’t really translate into English since the literal translation ‘mean winter’ suggests something a lot deeper in snow and ‘skimpy winter’ or ‘scrimpy winter’ don’t convey very much. So we’ll settle for Snårlvinter.

 Helje’s little Brownie was on the very first (ugh – ‘the very first’  - horrible expression.  I mean, of course, simply ‘the first’.) card that I put on a  postcard blog – see here.

1113 – From Eva in Morocco came this card of Tangier.  On the left is Hercules’s cave.  

It is said to be the shape of Africa, which, if you turn it round, I think it is. 

So presumably if you look inwards from outside it looks Africa-shaped but that would be so much less impressive. 

A new stamp- 

One thousand cards...

1000 – from my friend Danielle.  This road sign story has become one of the most popular cards she has sent out.   I added it to my favourites and, hey presto, it appeared on my doormat.

I like this stamp

1001 – And another from Danielle in Omaha. 

A certain irony that 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue should arrive just as the US government closed down.  It made this stamp rather ironic as well.

I can’t recall getting a lighthouse stamp before.  It’s surprising how many postcrossers like lighthouse cards. 

1001 - The gateway of the abbey of Our Lady of the Holy Spirit in Conyers, Georgia, from Kay and Richard.

Mid-October cards

993 – A map of Friesland from Monique (NL-2112408)

Friesland or Frisia is a province in the north of the Netherlands and part of the ancient, larger region of Frisia.  Friesland has 646,000 inhabitants (2010) and its capital is Leeuwarden (West Frisian: Ljouwert), with 91,817 inhabitants, in the centre of the province.   In 1996 the Friesland Provincial Council resolved that the official name of the province should follow the Frisian spelling rather than the Dutch spelling, resulting in "Friesland" being replaced by "Fryslân". In 2004 the Dutch Government confirmed this resolution, putting in place a three-year scheme to oversee the name change and associated cultural programme.

994 – Juned from Boogor on Java, south of Jakarta, sent me my first card from Indonesia (ID-72006) and appropriately it was this map.

 Another flag to add to my 'collection' of countries.

995 – Henny from the Netherlands sent me this (NL-2109818) painting of Pieter van Foreest Jordenszn (1521-1597), one of the most important doctors of The Netherlands, known as the "Dutch Hippocrates ".

I’m not sure if I have mentioned but the theme of the Europa stamps this year is postal vehicles.  This is one of the Netherlands ones.

996 – My friend Anastasia in Belarus sent me this great old picture of a postman delivering his mail.

997 – Another from Anastasia arrived the next day – 

 I think envy is one of the seven deadly sins but I go green whenever I see Anastasia's beautiful writing.

This stamp shows the Belarusian puppet theatre.  It is still very popular and there is a festival of students’ theatres in Minsk every year. 

998 – Jarma from Helsinki (FI-1888569) sent me this new Inge Löök card.  Hoorasy.  Don’t fprget you can see all my Inge Löök cards at this link.

999 – Apparently the 9^th October was World Post Day – a fact which would have passed me by but for this card from my friend Monica in Sweden.  This is Sweden’s first post-bus, in 1923, equipped for winter-driving.

The stamps also had a postal theme.