NO WAR

This week I've begun to receive postcards on Tuesday, but I love the two cards from soniasadin and nancy.

From Pamplona, soniasadin has sent me one of my favourite paintings, Guernica, by Picasso, became in symbol of the horrors of war. Picasso painted it in 1937 at the height of the Spanish Civil War. The town of Guernica was bombed on April 26th, 1937.

Nancy from China has sent me a beautiful UNESCO Site for the "Spain to the Rest of the World" tag. It is the traditional village of Xidi. The Ancient Villages in Southern Anhui, Xidi and Hongcun, were declared World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 2000, because they "preserve to a remarkable extent the appearance of non-urban settlements of a type that largely disappeared or was transformed during the last century. Their street plan, their architecture and decoration, and the integration of houses with comprehensive water systems are unique surviving examples.

The villages of Xidi and Hongcun are graphic illustrations of a type of human settlement created during a feudal period and based on a prosperous trading economy. In their buildings and their street patterns, the two villages of southern Anhui reflect the socio-economic structure of a long-lived settled period of Chinese history. The traditional non-urban settlements of China, which have to a very large extent disappeared during the past century, are exceptionally well preserved in the villages of Xidi and Hongcun.

Views from Japan

For my collection I've received from Japan five official postcard since I began in Postcrossing.

Two days ago, amenote wrote me because she sent me a postcard last December 18th and I had not registered it... and today I received it, after travelling 50 days. It's a nice painting of Japanese art, showing sumo wrestlers in the ring before a match.


But my first Japanese postcard was this one, that I received in May from Non: the Nijo Castle, in Kyoto.



Last summer, Yukimi sent me the third postcard, this time of Miyajima, in Hiroshima. It's registered as part of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites.




This multiview of Tokyo was sent by misuzu. Some views of Akihabara Shopping Square - Main Gate of "Senso Ji" Temple Imperial Palace "Chiyoda-Jo" Castle - Tokyo Station.



And finally basketwork sent me in Christmas this postcard with something typical in her region, Japanese green tea.

Painting of the Harbour

I received this nice postcard from Susyq. The painting in the card is a view from Helsinki, near Harbour, by artist Matti Vainikainen (1980).



ID: FI-281568
Received: April 17th, 2008
Distance: 3,610 Kms (2,243 Miles)
Travel time: 4 days

Hanko, Finland

When I signed to Postcrossing, I wished to receive postcards from Finland, because I wanted to get the euro cents from that country. I didn't know yet that Finnish postcrossers were the most active users. Thanks to Postcrossing I've known many things about Finland.

The first postcard I received was sent by suvir, a painting of the Hanko Casino. "In the late 19th century, while Finland was still a Grand Duchy under Russia, Hanko was a popular spa resort for the Russian nobility. Some of the buildings from that period survive, notably the Hanko Casino (which is not a gambling establishment, but a former banquet hall of the spa). It is nowadays a restaurant" (Wikipedia).


ID: FI-272831
Received: March 28th, 2008
Distance: 3,366 Kms (2,092 Miles)
Travel time: 9 days