Postcrossing

As I've said many times, I love post.  Buying stationery, writing letters, receiving letters, I love it all.  I'm a member of a #Postcircle group and I have a few friends spread around the world with whom I exchange letters.

One of these friends I met at university through Girlguiding, and we stayed in touch when she went off on her year abroad.  She now teaches English abroad and has done a lot of travelling, so I have post from her from all over the world.

Recently, she posted a Facebook status about how she'd spent the evening writing lots of postcards to people in different countries.  I presumed she meant friends she'd made from her travels, but then she mentioned Postcrossing.  Intrigued, I investigated this Postcrossing, and I am now well and truly hooked.

Like all good ideas, it's incredibly simple.  You register and create a profile, including your home address and a little bit about yourself.  Then you click on 'send a postcard' and you will be given the profile of another Postcrosser (you can only see people's addresses when you have been sent their profile, addresses aren't freely accessible).  You read their information, choose and write a postcard, and then post it to them.  You get given a unique number to write on the card, so when it arrives the recipient can register it and you know it's arrived safely.  As soon as your card has been registered your profile will then go to the next person from anywhere in the world who clicks on 'send a postcard'.

Now how simple is that?!

I love it.  Absolutely love it.  What I love the most (and something I honestly wasn't expecting) is how appropriate the postcards I've been sent are for me.

This came from Japan:


This one from Finland:


This one from Germany:


This one from Belarus:


This one is also from Germany:


Tea!  Books!  Biscuits!  Reading!  More tea!

My profile I think is quite short - I wrote that I like tea, books, reading, crochet and knitting, travelling, and I'm a Girlguiding volunteer.  I love how people have taken the time to read my profile, and then choose a card they think I will like.  The messages on the back wish me a good day, good weather, and give a little insight into someone else's day.

I've sent cards to Finland, Germany, USA, and Russia - these have been safely registered, and I've got a few still travelling (bit concerned about the one that I posted 33 days ago to Spain!).  It's been interesting reading people's profiles: knowing how much thought went into mine, I want to send thoughtful postcards as well.  Most of the profiles I've read so far have asked for postcards of the local area - well, that's easy enough!  Another said they preferred cards with trains on, or transport in general, so I sent one of a London red bus.

An international stamp costs 97p, and I bought a variety of postcards online, which worked out as 8.7p each.  So sending one card costs about £1, which I feel is a perfectly reasonable cost.  As there's no information given to you as to whether people have sent you anything, it's very exciting when I do get a card in the post!  On the website you can also see how far a postcard has travelled, how long it took, as well as cumulative totals, my sent postcards all together have travelled 12,175km!

Now I just need to think about what I can do with all of these lovely, thoughtful cards...!

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