Do you display your postcards in your wall? I mean, on your REAL wall?
We know some of you do. But Andy in the U.K. decided to go extra an mile with the wall concept and created the 'My REAL wall' project. Here’s what he has to say about it:
I am a teacher based in London, uk and love photography, travelling and writing.
A few months ago I closed my facebook account and since then I have decided only to receive REAL post, instead of letting people post on a virtual wall.
Whenever I receive REAL post I stick it up on my REAL wall and take a photograph of it, which I then upload to my website, www.myrealwall.com.
And he has photos of many different walls too! So go check it out!
19 comments so far
Yea! I love it! How great to have a personal connection to people in this age of "one click!"
My whole room wall (2 sides - 1 side is a window and the other is a built-in cupboard) is totally covered with stuff. Everything is so close together and there's no more space, that I have started pasting ON TOP of the things stuck on my wall now. I think I have to take a picture one of these days. My friends find it scary, but also interesting, to see the different stuff pasted on my wall. Haha. I still have 2 rooms to fill though. XD In one of the rooms, I have devoted the walls entirely to postcards.
Ooh.That's cool.
Great idea :-D But how do you get (or rather, force) your friends and relatives to start writing and sending you real mail?
Interesting idea!!! :D
So cool! But I can not open his website.
Thanks for all your support and thanks to Paulo for posting the blog.
Icylove - If you're having trouble getting through, why not go straight through to the blog address at http://myrealwall.blogspot.com or you can check the photos out on my flickr site at http://www.flickr.com/photos/andytgeezer/sets/72157613833427884/
Wow Ammy - your wall with postcards on top of postcards sounds amazing! If you send me your address, I'd be quite happy to send you one more for the wall and if you take a pic of it and send it back I'll include your wall on the "your REAL wall" section of my site! http://myrealwall.blogspot.com/search/label/yourREALwall
:-)
lostsoule77 - Getting my facebook friends to write was nearly impossible and I tried emailing and sending them REAL post to get them into action for about a month (see earlier posts like http://www.flickr.com/photos/andytgeezer/3285699287/in/set-72157613833427884/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/andytgeezer/3327329232/in/set-72157613833427884/ - which both contain hardly anything - it was all made by me!)
After a while I just gave up on trying to keep in touch with facebook friends (who in truth I don't really see anyway) and decided to take this opportunity to meet new friends instead!
So I guess the moral of the story is that if your friends don't write to you you can't force them - just get a new set of friends!
What a great idea! In a way it's sad that nearly everything is virtual or digital nowadays. Have you ever thought what memories we leave for our children and grandchildren? That's why I print my photos on paper, for example. The best ones, of course. ;) In Postcrossing we also leave short notes of our life behind us.
I do have some postcards in my real wall ^^
I got Andy's address shortly after he began his real wall and it was a kick to see my postcard (made from a photo I took of stone towers built on a beach on Lake Superior) on his "real wall" website. :D It's been fun to check back and see what else he's added or where he's posted it next.
Hi Freshwater - I loved your card and it's great to see that you're still tuning in.
Thanks for all your comments and messages - it's so great to see that so many of you put your cards up on walls. If you message me your address I'd be happy to send cards to you for your walls. If you take a picture of your wall with my postcard on and email it to me I'll include it on the site under "your REAL wall" - it's a crowd participation event!
I'm also collecting postcrossing cards to a wall. It's in the kitchen, and I've made it a fake café wall. Kind of. The café has a title and a view to the rooftops of Paris (my own photo printed in A4). I pin scenery postcards around that setting, so I can have views from all over the world. Currently there's no room for other kinds of cards, but perhaps I'll make a place for them too somewhere.
What comes to Facebook and virtual messaging with friends, I've so much grown up to that over the years, that I really couldn't go back to living like we did in the 1980's and early 1990's. Wouldn't want to go back. I *love* the possibilities I've gotten with the internet, computers and mobile phones. And without Facebook I couldn't have found all those old friends I lost contact with over the years. Agreed that parts of it seem very unnecessary and even irritating.
Great idea! :)
I'm hoping to pin them all to a big map one day.
AS for facebook, it certainly has a great deal of good things about it, and I find these days that when I talk to people about facebook they find themselves apologising for using it like it's a guilty pleasure! I'm not against facebook, it's just not the way I like to socialise.
Long live REAL interactions with people!
Hurray for doing it analog in this digital world! :D
@Andy: Sent!
Thanks Ammy. I've been a little busy but will drop yours in the post by the end of this week I hope. In case any postcrossers have missed the action this week - my REAL wall is now on the front page of the Hammersmith and Kensington Times (A local newspaper) at www.hktimes.co.uk - I get so much post from postcrossing and others that the local council think I am running a business and have threatened to charge me business rates for waste disposal!
Check out the whole story on http://myrealwall.blogspot.com/2009/10/my-real-wall-in-local-news.html