Postcrossing Blog

martinha (aka Marta) is a very active member on the forum's Portuguese community. Like many of us, she likes UNESCO images and other historical places on her postcards. Here is what she had to say:

How did you come across Postcrossing? What got you hooked?

Back in 2006 a friend send me a text message with the site. He read about it on a magazine. I thought it was one of his silly messages but as i was working in front of the computer i decided to check the site. This sentence caught my attention “It’s a project that allows anyone to receive postcards (real ones, not electronic) from random places in the world.” After a bit of reading I registered, a few days later I sent the first cards and started doing some private trades. That was in September and in November I discovered the forum and then it got serious. Since then I’ve been receiving cards almost everyday.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Apart of collecting cards, I love to take pictures and travelling. These three hobbies are closely related to each other. My last travels were truly influenced by Postcrossing and by the lovely people I got to know these last years due to postcard exchanges.

Show us your mailbox, your mailman/mailwoman, your post office or the place where you post or keep your postcards!

I have 4 or 5 post offices in my city but this one is the biggest and the one I use the most. Some of the workers already know me, some call me the “stamp girl”; they don’t need to ask want I want, just how many stamps do I need.

This is my not so pretty mailbox but it sure makes me happy every time I find nice cards inside it.

Show and tell us about your favorite received postcard to date, and what makes it special.

I’ve got more than 4000 postcards, choosing a favourite card is impossible, I have too many favorite cards. As you can see on the picture, i truly enjoy beautiful landscapes and architecture. Every time I travel I try to visit historical places with wonderful architecture or breathtaking landscapes. The world is too big and I won’t be able to visit a lot of places; getting cards from places like that is the best and cheapest way to see the world.

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

I love the excitement of opening my mailbox and finding cards; getting an address, reading the profile and finding the perfect card to that person and most of all getting in touch with people around the world. Thanks to Postcrossing I’ve met great friends.

Have you met any other members in real life?

I’ve met a lot of postcrossers from different countries and I know the most active members in the Portuguese community. We’re a great group of friends now and we often have meetings or travel together.
I’ve been to 2 big international meetings, the international one in Zurich last year and the Köln meeting last April. Both were wonderful opportunities to meet postcrossers and make great friends. I’ve also met a few postcrossers that were visiting Portugal.

Américo is 58 y.o. and lives in Santiago do Cacém, Portugal. He joined short after Postcrossing was born and is now amongst the Top 50 with more than 1400 cards sent. He has favorite cards but above all, he distinguishes the people who send them.

How did you come across Postcrossing? What got you hooked?

I have read about Postcrossing in an online portuguese newspaper just a few days after the project begun and decided to visit it. Just for curiosity…!!! I got hooked by the possibility to receive cards from different people all over the world. From that moment on I became a compulsive postcard collector!

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I love reading, listening to music, swimming, walking on the beach and surfing the net.

Show us your mailbox, your mailman/mailwoman, your postoffice or the place where you post or keep your postcards!

This is the mailbox where I post my cards. It’s the only one existing in the very small village of Vale de Água.

The stairs are used to help some people to reach the box because it’s too high (just kidding !!!)

Show & tell us about your favorite received postcard to date, and what makes it special.

Obviously I have my favorites among all cards I have received. However I think I prefer to distinguish those Postcrossers who have tremendous difficulties to get a simple postcard (for a lot of reasons) and send it everytime they get an address.

Few projects connect people from so many random contexts as the Postcrossing project. It’s amazing how diverse our users are and we are always eager to learn more from them. Thus, we decided to start the Postcrossing spotlight – interviews done with members of this project that we will publish every two weeks here on the Postcrossing Blog. We want to share with all of you how diverse our community is and we hope you all enjoy it.

We know that many of you would like to know a bit more about the project founder. So, to start the Postcrossing spotlight interviews, here’s what Paulo himself has to say as our first interviewee. See you in two weeks!

How did you come across Postcrossing? What got you hooked?

I always enjoyed sending and receiving mail, specially postcards. Friends and family frequently received postcards from me, but I wanted to exchange even more, specially with more far away places.

So, I have put that together with my IT background, the initial concept started to develop and a few months later, Postcrossing was ready.

I’m both proud and happy that this project has touched and connected so many different people around the world, ignoring age, gender, location, religion and even belief. And it’s not just about postcards any more, it’s also about the connections created. I hope it continues to do so for a very long time.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Recently I have been doing Geocaching – for the ones who don’t know it, Geocaching are mini treasure hunts done with the help of a GPS device. It’s a lot of fun plus I get to visit interesting places I would never get to if it wasn’t for it.

Besides that, I enjoy travelling across the world and live in different places to experience other cultures and different people. I’m originally from Portugal and in the past I have lived in the Netherlands, U.S.A. and for the last 2 years in China. I’ve just returned to Europe and soon I’ll be heading somewhere else. I guess I can be called a nomad!

Show us your mailbox, your mailman/mailwoman, your postoffice or the place where you post or keep your postcards!

Personally I don’t enjoy keeping the postcards in albums because I like to have them handy in a way I can pick them all up and flip through them whenever I want to.

We always wanted to have one of those postcard racks that you see in small stores to display the postcards. However, we couldn’t find one so Ana came up with a great alternative: using Ikea pot lids holders instead, the effect is the same plus our postcards are always displayed and ready to be picked up. It even has different slot sizes so that any postcard size has it’s own place – it’s perfect!

Show & tell us about your favorite received postcard to date, and what makes it special.

I honestly lost count to the number of postcards I have received to date and it’s almost impossible to pick just one favourite. I like pretty much any type of postcard since they are always special in their own way. However, there’s one that is particularly special to me: PT-1 was the first Postcrossing postcard and it’s only fair I pick it as my favourite. And yes, I like lighthouses! :)