Swap #1

Private swaps are quite common on the Postcrossing site ... members can check a box on their profiles to indicate whether they are interested in these or not. If they say they are, you can send them an email and ask them to swap with you. Of course I've been trying this out. :-)

When I post about swaps here I will only count the actually completed ones. My first ever PX swap was not initiated by me, but by another user - I agreed to the swap, emailed back my address, sent the card, then never heard anything more. I haven't received anything from her, not even a response to my email asking if she's gotten my card. And she's still active on the site. >:-( But I won't be counting swaps like these, and after this post will not be blogging about them either. It's not a big deal, these things sometimes happen and you've just got to let it go. But only completed swaps will get their own blog posts here. :-)

My first successful swap was initiated by me. I found this user, Simona in Lithuania, after just surfing the site. Her profile was interesting - I'm an Elvis fan too ;-) - and she wanted to swap stamps. I kind of collect stamps too - very small scale, but still - and I thought I'd quite like to get some Lithuanian ones. I had plenty of extra Norwegian stamps lying around that I could send. I also had a card showing an interesting animal, which is on her list of interests. I emailed her to see if she was interested, and she was, so I got some stamps together and sent them off to Lithuania.

The card I sent, on November 7th, shows one of my three pet turtles, Raphael, a male red eared slider, Trachemys scripta elegans, out on a walk on the lawn outside my apartment building.

Simona sent me a lovely multiview card from Klaipeda, which is the nearest larger town to where she lives. It looks like a very charming place. :-) The card arrived on November 10th.

I also got these great Lithuanian stamps. And I learned from this swap that Lithuania in Lithuanian is Lietuva. You can learn something new every day! :-D

Received card #17

The third and last card to arrive on November 4th came from China. Yay. :-) I love getting cards from China - I had an amazing time there on a three week round trip some years ago. I did not visit Huang's home town of Guangzhou, but a number of other cities.

The card Huang sent shows a view from the Xiaoqikong Park in Guizhou province.

It was sent on October 23rd, and it traveled 8,477 kilometers in 12 days.

The stamp on the card was beautiful - it showed a gorgeous dragonfly, which is my favorite insect, I love these creatures. :-) This was quite a coincidence, since I had actually forgotten to add dragonflies to my favorites list on my profile. (I've fixed that now. ;-) So I was just really lucky. :-)

Received card #1

My first received card arrived on October 9th. What a great surprise! :-) I had thought it would have taken longer - it had only been two days since my first sent card had been registered as received. But it's obviously true that as soon as that happens with one of your sent cards, you're put on the list to receive. As soon as. :-) I was thrilled to get the card, it was a lovely card and it really brightened my day. :-)

The card was sent by Merja in Lappi in Finland. The stamp is amazing, it shows a viviparous lizard lying on a rock, and it's just beautiful. It says in my profile that I like reptiles a lot, and Merja seemed to have really taken that into consideration. So that made me happy. :-)

I have a suggestion on my profile about what people can write on their cards to me - a question for them to answer, specifically. Namely this: What are the the top three things that any visitor to your town ought to see? Merja thinks that in Lappi, what a tourist should be sure not to miss are the fields and forests of the area, lake Pyhäjärvi, and a bronze age burial site that is on the World Heritage list. So I really learned something new from her card. :-)

The card travelled 638 kilometers to get to me, and it took two days.

And here's the lovely stamp. :-) Click to enlarge, to really see the wonderful detail.