Postcrossing Blog

Carol (aka carolreader) hails from Ohio, a northern US state. She’s been a postcrosser for over 8 years, juggling a stressful job, family life and distance running, along with sending postcards! :)

Here is what she had to say:

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

My daughter always finds new and interesting things. She told me that she’d joined Postcrossing and received a postcard from a teacher in Japan. I thought that was so cool!

When I first joined, I asked for only one address. I had no postcards, nor did I know where to buy any. So I took my lunch hour at work and walked around downtown Cleveland, Ohio, looking for a postcard to send. I found a nice one! Since then, I’ve learned where to find postcards, and try to have a variety of cards on hand to send.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I am addicted to distance running, and I run between one and twenty amateur races every year. This was actually an obsession a few years ago – I spent two years trying to qualify to run the Boston Marathon — to do this, you have to run another marathon in a certain time, depending upon your age. I achieved my goal in 2009, and ran Boston in 2009 at the age of 58. I consider this one of the great achievements of my life. I started running in my 40’s, and I’d never been athletic. I worked for this, and got lucky.

But the older I get, the harder it gets to run. I keep at it because it makes me feel good, and good about myself. But I’m too old for marathons now!

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

This is the letter box at work where I mail many of my cards:

My postcards albums for received cards:

And boxes of cards on hand to send out:

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

Picking out the right card to send, absolutely. I love trying to find different kinds of cards, so that I have the right card to fit even an odd request or interest.

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

I love quirky cards – and I love animals. Here are some quirky animal cards that I like a lot:

The one below from Russia translates to “Smile, it irritates people.” I thought it was funny, and loved the great message on the other side.

But another card sticks in my mind – it wasn’t just a card, it was a card and a letter and two photos. A group of girl guides from Poland sent me group pictures, and told me about themselves. I love all the cards I receive, but every so often one arrives that warms my heart –and often from an unexpected place!

Have you met any other members in real life?

A few years ago, I went to a small meet up in Minneapolis with forum members. It was great fun. I would love to see a meet up in northern Ohio. In a year or two, when I retire from my job, I hope to organize one. In the meantime…perhaps someone else will volunteer?

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I love hearing from people all over the world, regardless of the politics between our countries. I don’t know if this type of person-to-person communication would have been possible 40 years ago. I can “talk” to people in other nations now that I would never have dreamed of back in those days. I need to hope and believe that this doesn’t stop!

Madeleine (aka poissonrouge) is a Swiss teacher and the only postcrosser in Guinea (not to be confused with Guinea-Bissau or Equatorial Guinea). She has done a remarkable job of putting her adopted country on our map, by sending over 400 postcards from there… though this isn’t an easy job, as you will read on her interview!

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

I was reading a book in English, and I stumbled upon a new word for me: swap. To fully understand what a swap was, I googled it, and that’s how I discovered this postcards swapping project. I immediately loved the concept and I registered and sent my first cards at once. Now I really know what a swap is! :-)

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Raising hens!

Some time ago, I received three beautiful Senegalese hens. Now I am looking for a Senegalese rooster, to start a small breeding. After a couple of months, I shall be able to train other women to do it too.

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

There are no mail carriers in Guinea, and hardly a few post offices.

Every week, my friends in Conakry fetch my post. They put it in a blue metal suitcase, and give the suitcase to a bus driver who drives the 600 km to Kissidougou once a week. The driver gives it to another friend in Kissidougou, and I go fetch it on my motorcycle. I am always eager to open it, as I never know what will be inside. Postcards and letters for me and my colleagues of course, among other gifts from friends everywhere in Guinea, as we have several suitcases travelin the whole country.

And when I want to send cards (that is, every week), I put them in the same blue suitcase, and it goes back to Conakry.

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

It’s not about this very card specifically, but I collect cards about rice and cards about fields, so no wonder I cherish every rice field card.

Rice is the main food in Guinea: no rice, no life. I think seeing rice fields of different countries (or rice grains, or rice dishes), is very interesting. My Guinean friends love to see them too. They are amazed at this card especially, because a machine is doing all the work. In Guinea, men and women do all the work, sometimes with oxen. Here you have the harvest, Guinean style:

Have you inspired anyone else to join Postcrossing or start collections of their own?

My mother joined Postcrossing too some time after me, and then my sister. Unfortunately my sister stopped when she opened her own surgery. That was too already much work.

I tried to convince people in Guinea, but it’s very hard: sending a card costs what a poor family needs to eat for one day. And richer people misunderstand it as… a global dating service :-)

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I am passionate about my job. I love all aspects of it (apart from accountancy). It could be called “helping people, especially women, to get self sufficient”. Training literacy teachers and trainers, writing or translating booklets in the Kissi language, teaching French and African literature, teaching how to make medical ointments or beauty creams, sewing, baking, … there are many useful things to do here.

But of course now with the ebola epidemic, I put all my strength in the fight against this disease. So instead of writing booklets about the medical uses of the papaya, it’s all about preventing ebola.

This is our 100th Postcrossing spotlight, hurraaay! :) In order to celebrate, I thought I’d hijack the post and interview myself, for a change. That seemed like a good idea at the time, but turns out, these questions are actually hard work to answer, and it’s taken a while to finish it… Anyway, Hi! I am Ana (aka meiadeleite), I come from Portugal and I wear the hat of community manager, here at Postcrossing.

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

There was once this quiet boy who wouldn’t stop nagging me with his idea of “making a website where we could randomly send postcards to other people and they would send postcards to us”… (I mean, weren’t MY postcards enough for him?! *humpf*)

He bugged me to do a logo for this website of his, and then one day, dropped by with a very cute (but ridiculously overpriced) postcard, and told me “Here you go – this will be the first card from Postcrossing! Let’s go register it!”

We tested the website a bit more, sending postcards back and forth between the two of us, and then proceeded to bully all our friends into signing up. Many of them did — we still know all the first members by name. I guess the rest is history!

Looking back, it seems unbelievable now, but that first year, I only sent 20 postcards (Paulo sent 11!). We were poor students…

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Not sure this qualifies as a hobby, but I’ve been keeping an irregular blog for over 10 years now, about our adventures around the world. Traveling, eating and analogue photography are some of the things I enjoy the most, so the blog features a lot of that.

Also, two years ago, I started filming one second of our days, every single day. It has turned into a way to stay in touch with our friends, but also a way to remember our days as time goes by. I love the result and cherish the short monthly videos immensely.

I’ve also been known for being a compulsory list-maker, and I especially like the 101 things in 1001 days format… though I usually pack so many complex items into my lists, I tend to end up running out of time to finish them!

Truth be told, my problem is that I’m interested in so many things: stationery, how-things-work, cookery, languages, traveling, science, knitting, paper crafts… if only days had more hours in them!

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

Here is my mailbox:

Ahah! :) Does that count? I don’t have a proper mailbox at the moment due to a frustrating moving situation. All my postcards have been stored in boxes for months now — very sad indeed.

I have, however, just finished this year’s Month of Letters, and have been posting my postcards and letters all over Portugal’s southernmost region:

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

My favorite part is definitely the sending. I try to make the postcards special, and give some use to my ever-growing collection of washi tape, stickers and rubber-stamps… I aim to make every postcard different and special… though most of the time I just ramble about my day.

On my profile, I list a few of my favorite things (à la Sound of Music), and ask the senders to share theirs with me. Some do — it always makes my day to read about other people’s favorite things on the postcards they send me! :)

Have you been surprised by any place that you have received a postcard from or sent a postcard to?

I remember one day receiving postcard DE-1 on my mailbox, the first postcard ever sent from Germany and thinking… who is this person?! Do we know them from somewhere? How did they find out about the website?

Since then, a lot of postcards have surprised me! It’s not so much the place they come from though — more about the stories they carry, and the adventurous Google searches they trigger!

Have you inspired anyone else to join Postcrossing or start collections of their own?

Yup! I’d like to think I’ve inspired quite a few people to join Postcrossing with all the blabbering I do about it for newspapers, TV, radio stations… or anyone who will listen really!

One year ago, I even stepped on a stage and delivered a TEDx talk about the project in front of 700 people… a very scary but rewarding experience. My most recent convert was a post office clerk who was wondering why I needed to buy so many stamps… :)

Have you met any other members in real life?

YES, lots of them, from all over the world! Everywhere we go, we try to either attend or organize a meetup to meet the local postcrossers. I’m always surprised at how postcrossers are the nicest people! And of course… they always know where the best postcards are to be found! :)

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

There are 2 things always on my mind: Postcrossing… and food! Not necessarily together, unless they’re these delicious cookies our friend C. did some years ago:

I’ve always liked letters, postcards, stamps and mail art… so when Postcrossing slowly started to taking over my life, it felt almost natural. I love that my days are spent helping hundreds of people worldwide experience that spike of joy when they open their mailbox and discover something there.

Though if you ask my family what I’m passionate about, they’ll shout “EGGS!”… and I’m afraid it’s true. I love food and cooking in general (the whole nose-to-tail), with eggs being a special obsession! :)

Most of all? I love the quiet, geeky boy who wouldn’t stop nagging me about a website where people could exchange postcards…

We met Lucy (aka Lucy156) a couple of years ago in Oxford, and we were immediately struck by her cheerfulness and sense of humor! Plus, she informed us which magazine had free Doctor Who postcards… we were instant friends! :) Here’s her interview:

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

I discovered Postcrossing in June 2006, quite by accident! I was searching for new penpals to exchange letters and postcards with and found this site! I immediately liked the idea of sending postcards to many different people across the world, from different cultures, to share views of where I live and have visited but also to learn more about where they live and places that they have visited.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

My other interests, besides Postcrossing of course, are penpalling, listening to a wide range of music from classical to jazz and blues to rock, watching various drama and sci-fi programmes, going to the cinema and taking weekends away with my partner Mark in out red VW campervan called Babs.

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

My local post office and post box is just a short trip into town for me. The staff at the office know me well and always save a sheet of new stamps when they are issued for me to collect, which makes me very happy!

My mailbox is in the communal area in the block of apartments where I live… my postman enjoy seeing all the different kinds of cards I get and has admitted to looking through them before dropping them into my box!

I file all my received cards into boxes by country, which I really enjoy organising. My available cards are also sorted into boxes by theme so that I can easily find them!

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

I love being surprised when I open my mail box to find a new postcard in there and getting online to register it and find out more about the area where the card has come from or discover more about the theme that it relates to! I enjoy updating my flickr page with received postcards and ones that I have ready to send…I like to try and find a special one for each person that I get details of and enjoy taking the time to do this. I have a Blogger page too which is fun to keep, when I find time between sending postcards and penpal letters!

I also enjoy taking part in the Round Robins and tags on the forum, where I get to meet so many more people and get lots of great postcards on the themes I enjoy!

Have you been surprised by any place that you have received a postcard from or sent a postcard to?

One of my earliest postcards was from Nicaragua, which I am sorry to say I did not know where it was at the time when I received it! At least my knowledge of geography has hopefully improved with the help from Postcrossing!

Have you met any other members in real life?

I have been luckily enough to attend 2 International Postcrossing Meetup’s in Oxford in 2013 and London in 2014! I met Ana and Paulo, founders of Postcrossing, who are two of the nicest and most genuine people I have ever met along with many others who attended from across the UK, Europe and beyond!

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I love watching Strictly Come Dancing, having been a ballroom and latin american dancer prior to an accident in 2011 which resulted in partial paralysis. I have been lucky enough to dance with one of the professionals on the UK show, Anton du Beke. I enjoy exploring the UK and Europe either as a driving holiday or on a cruise ship, particularly to places with history, museums, galleries and places which has unusual features to photography!

Andrea (aka Sprinkledonut) is a world traveler and her beautifully decorated postcards caught the attention of some of you, who suggested we interviewed her for the Spotlight… here she is!

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

Hmm, you mean there was a time in my life before Postcrossing? Haha! I joined four years ago after learning about it on another website that I am passionate about: Couchsurfing.org. Someone posted about it in one of the group forums. I am very grateful to them wherever they are today!

I was hooked from the get-go! I loved seeing what types of interesting cards people would send me, what their handwriting looked like and all the little details.

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

Here’s our typical Canadian mailbox, covered in postal codes as an anti-graffiti measure. It seems to work! Whenever I drop in my postcards it sounds like they’re landing in a hollow cavern 10,000 miles below the surface of the earth. Where’s everybody else’s mail, I wonder??

Have you been surprised by any place that you have received a postcard from or sent a postcard to?

I received a random card from Fiji which was very special. I’m a big fan of direct swaps so some of my fun direct swaps have been with people in New Zealand, Estonia, Kenya and Bangladesh.

Sometimes I like to check out this site to see what new stamps are being issued around the world. With the direct swaps to New Zealand and Estonia, I asked the people if they could send me a particular wonderful stamp and they were happy to help! Thanks, guys!

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

Bicycle cards are my absolute favourite to receive. Here’s just part of my bike collection:

Airmail stickers from around the world and some favourite art-themed postcards:

Cards with quotes and positive messages. You can see two here from my friend Yvonne in the Netherlands who always sends me fantastic cards!

Have you inspired anyone else to join Postcrossing or start collections of their own?

When I was buying stamps in Portugal, all of the people in their post offices were really friendly. I told one of the postal workers about it and wrote down the website for him, which he immediate showed to his coworkers. I think he was excited to check it out! Some of my friends have signed up, too, when they saw what beautiful postcards I was receiving.

Maybe you have read this tip before but they say the best way to get mail is to send mail. I make a habit of sending postcards to my friends so now lots of my friends will send me postcards when they travel or just for no occasion but because they saw a card that they know I will like.

What is it your favorite part of the Postcrossing process?

Definitely working on outgoing cards for people!

I try to choose a card that fits what they like to collect but the part I really love is decorating the back of the card. It’s a bit of an elaborate process…first choosing the stamps (always more than one!), then glitter around the border. Next the stickers. Then the rubber stamps! Finally if there is any room left, I can write a tiny message. Haha, if you have received one of my cards you will know what I’m talking about. My goal is always to give someone a happy surprise when they turn the card over to read it. Plus when I’m busy working on the cards, it is like a form of art therapy for me. It’s really fun and I get to be creative.

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

Well, traveling and couchsurfing are a big hobby of mine. I’ve been part of Couchsurfing for over ten years. It’s an online project that connects travelers with hosts in cities around the world. I recently couchsurfed my way around Portugal this past June. Couchsurfing.org has the same kind of open, caring, friendly and generous spirit that Postcrossing has! Making the world seem just a little bit smaller. And of course I tell my hosts all about Postcrossing when they see me writing loads of postcards.

Is there anything that you are passionate about?

I love to participate in Free Hugs events. So far I have given hugs in: Vancouver, Seattle, New York, Barcelona, Lisbon, Montreal and Austin. When we have a hugs event, people often ask why we are doing it. To share some love with the world. To make you feel good for a moment or maybe longer. To take away some stress, fear or loneliness. And hopefully because it feels nice and makes us both smile! Like sending a postcard.