Postcrossing Blog

Andy (or Duplevista) is 52 and lives in Southampton in the UK. He is known for being very interested in anything related with buses and is specially keen on squared postcards. Here’s what he has to share with us.

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

I was a member of various postcard e-groups and a Norwegian guy that I swapped with told me about Postcrossing. After just sending officials for a short while I discovered the forum button – then I was really hooked!

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I am interested in all forms of public transport, especially buses and spend as much of my spare time visiting places and logging the details of the vehicles seen to record on my database. Strange as it may seem, its a great excuse for visiting new places!

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

The part of the front room that I laughingly call my office, where the majority of my postcard stuff is.

As the post office that I use the most is just a small part of a newsagents, I decided to send a picture of one of the delivery vans to be different.

Where most of my cards and envelopes get posted. It is an older box with GR indicating it was new in the reign of King George VI. Unusual in the fact it is built into a freestanding brick structure.

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

This was sent to me as a RAS by aj-person from Finland. I have developed a great love of Square shaped postcards.

This was given to me by MissMaple after the Art Unlimited meeting when I raided her doubles box!

Have you met any other members in real life?

I am lucky enough to have met quite a few, the first that I met was lovely ElSol from Russia. Since then I have met those at the London Meeting, and the meeting in Alkmaar at Art Unlimited. I have formed a lasting friendship with MissMaple and Thaddee_Calisson especially, amongst many others.

Have you ever wondered how postcards get to you? I mean, we all know how to send them and we know it’s our mail carrier who delivers them – but what about the rest?

Wonder no more – we have found a great video that shows how the magic happens between the sender and the receiver. It documents a sample delivery through the UK Royal Mail but the process worldwide doesn’t differ that much. Enjoy!

Quite impressive, isn’t it?

David “the mad postcard collector” from the United Kingdom has amassed over 100,000 postcards for his collection. This 56 year old multilingual Postcrosser is also a world traveler.

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

I have been hooked on collecting postcards since I was a teenager. I joined two postcard-collecting groups within Mensa, one who was already also a Postcrosser, introduced me to Postcrossing, and I have been totally hooked ever since! My wife, Jeannette, keeps telling me off because I spend so much time writing postcards! I have always enjoyed having the postman deliver mail, so Sundays and public holidays are sad because there is no mail. I am so well-known by my local postmen that I even had a postcard addressed simply to 'The mad postcard collector, Felixstowe' delivered to me!

Do you have any other interesting hobbies?

I love travelling and have visited more than 70 countries in Europe, Asia, Africa and North America. I love music. I learned to play the guitar (but not very well) and wrote my own songs. I even recorded several of my songs, although they are not available commercially. And I love languages too: I studied French, German, Spanish and Latin at school, taught myself Dutch, Italian, Russian and several other languages; I’m learning Japanese at evening classes too. So my hobbies of travel, languages and postcards are all related.

This is a picture of me playing my guitar and 'performing’ at my 50th birthday party!

This picture, taken two years ago, shows me when I changed a small amount of money ($100) at a bank in Uzbekistan.

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

One picture shows Bent Hill Post Office, Felixstowe. It’s a short walk from where I live. I buy most of my postcards there and all of my stamps, so I’m their favourite customer! The other picture, which is not so clear, is a scanned copy of a picture taken for a newspaper in 2006; it shows me with a few of my postcards and with some of the crates in which I store my collection.

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

I have received nearly 3000 official postcards through Postcrossing, many more through swaps, Round Robins etc. I cannot single out one postcard as so many are my favourites!

A postcard has been delivered by Britain’s Royal Mail 79 years after it was sent.

The picture postcard was sent in 1929 from Burnham-on-Crouch, Essex, and intended for Mr and Mrs Richardson in East Dulwich, London.
However it was not delivered until a week ago when it finally dropped through the letter box of Arthur Davies and June Nicolopoulos after a delay of nearly eight decades.

Mr Davies, 59, a construction manager, said: “I’ve heard of delays but this takes some beating – I reckon it’s been under a skirting board at a Royal Mail building all this time.

”It’s amazing that Royal Mail even delivered it at all after all these years."

The postcard arrived inside a Royal Mail envelope with a sticker reading, “we are sorry that this item has been damaged/delayed in the post”.

From an article on The West Australian, click to continue reading.

Wow! What a great journey this postcard has had! I wonder where that postcard had been hiding… :)