Well its a sunday right now in most parts of the world, so I'm not going to bother you today with long lectures. Just enjoy this very neat miniature sheet & art of Edward Wiiralt. The Sheet is from Estonia.
I humbly apologise to the readers for sending them such a small & indistinct picture, but the original sheet is really stunning & worth getting your hands onto.
Have a great Weekend.
After yesterdays remark about the nice postmark, I wanted to show you all a nice postmark that I remembered seeing a few days back. I finall found it & its there for you to see. The stamp itself is nice and seems to be on the German Boxer (I assume)Max
Schemeling, who was around from 1905-2005 . I suppose the German Govt brought out the stamp as a tribute on his death.
It is the postmark that is very nice here & might actually be of the Philatelic dept & to be used on a different FDC. The Writing on the Stamp says "Briefzentrum 30 Hanaover" & below is the picture of a building of the Gothic style. I'm not entirely
sure of what all that means & stuck in the middle of the ocean with no google at hand is not likely to resolve the issue.
But the mark is nice nevertheless.
BTW, I did manage to post Paquebot letters to a few of you out there. I wonder if they will reach you ever. :)
We crossed the Equator an hour back and so I am Officially in the southern Hemisphere now. In view of that & the fact that I am coasting South America right now, I am showing you this cover from Brazil that Tito from Serjipe Brazil was kind enough to
send my way.
I am not sure what these stamps represent. The first stamp on the right shows the trumpet. I guess this must be one of the series of stamp on Musical instruments. The Second and third stamps are ones that seem to be cartoons themed on the working
people. The second stamps seems to represent Tailors (Costureira??) & the third Cobblers (Sapateiro) & the final stamp seems to be on education or something like that.
The postmark on the envelope is really nice & clear. It says "ACF - JARDINS ARACAJU-SE" . Its always a pleasure to see such clear postmarks.
It would have been great to have gone south of the Americas & visit Brazil but we'll stop our southeard voyage at Chile. Lets hope I can grab some stamps from there to show you people.
Thanks Tito.
Now that we are out of the Panama waters we can move on with their stamps & come back to the neat stuff you all have sent to me.
Featured above is the Miniature sheet of Bugs Bunny that I recd from US. The USPS released this sheet & others from the same house like Daffy duck etc, primarily to focus on the kids & inspire them to collect stamps. That probably is the reason that
even this sheet is a sticker stamp. Something that you just peel off & stick on to an envelope. While this does seem very convenient, it does irritate me. I think I have vented on this practice before & I think the Postal services should refrain from
doing so in future.
But lets talk about the stamp itself. The stamp itself is a smaller copy of the Miniature sheet & shows Bugs eating one of his trademark carrot. The carrot is probably stolen from poor Elmo's garden. Elmo, the chap who achieved instant fame & fortune
by coming at the end of the shows & saying "That's all folks", is also featured in another stamp.
And as a tribute the the postal service I guess they have Bugs reclining on the post box. I am given to understand that houses in the United states have these mail boxes fixed on the porches. I suppose that as the postman drops a letter, he lifts the
flap in the upright position to let the people inside the house know from within that there is some mail waiting for them in their box. This is a very interesting contraption & sadly even though I have been numerous times to the US, I am yet to witness
such a device. I wonder if they have such mailboxes in other parts of the world
Of course coming to the best part of the miniature - Bugs autographed it himself on the bottom right. :)
Since I am still technically in Panama waters, I wanted to show you one last stamp from here. This is the red backed Squirrel monkey of Panama. I believe that it is a protected species & the stamp is produced in collaboration with the WWF.
Panama is a beautiful country & as I crossed the Panama Canal, I could see Lush Green Forests barely 50 yards to either sides. I would love to say that I saw a lot of animals moving around the undergrowth, but sadly apart from one Croc basking in the
sun, I saw nothing.
But I did see that one croc. :)
Since our transit through the canal has been delayed by a day & I'm still around in their waters, let me show you another of their stamps. This by all intents looks like their declaration of independence.
I'm not sure how well you might be able to see this image, but the heading on the stamp is, "Centenario de Republica de Panama 1903-2003"
It is a nice stamp & like the train stamp on the previous post, also is on the classic look. On the whole a likable stamp. Another thing of interest is the Panama Flag on the background of the above writing. If you look closely, you can see the blue &
red diagonal squares & the star on the vacant square.
Yesterday as I came into Panama, I got my hands on a few stamps and postcards to send out to friends & family. And since am in Panama, I've shown you one of their stamps. This is a stamp of a train engine that by the inscription below (the bit that I
can understand) is from the period of 1855.
This does look a lot like the locomotive that they use these days in the canal locks. Probably these were the sort of engines that were used when the canal opened way back in 1913.
By some strange co-incidence, or probably there are a lot of these around, I seem to be accumlating as lot of tranin pictures. Maybe I should organise them into a collection as well.
In the recent snaps that I received, Gabor from Hungary sent me a lot of stamps on Hungarian aeroplanes & fishes. Also in that nice pile was a stamp on Snow white. Featured in the stamp are the Snow white & the Seven dwarfs. I must admit rather
shamefacedly that I am not very sure how this story goes. Let me go over it a bit.
There is of course an queen. She is this evil queen who is very vain. And she has a mirror. Which tells her that she is the fairest of them all. But not on one day when it says that snow white is the fairest of them all. The Queen then poisons Snow
white. With a red apple I think it was. Then the story gets a little foggy. snow white lies in a stupor and is tended to by seven dwarfs. I think she is sleeping and then a price kisses her. Or was that Sleeping Beauty? Regardless, there is a Handsome
Prince & there is a Kiss. And there is happily ever after.
That is the story of Snow White. Or as much of it as I know.
Thank you again Gabor. I sent something nice for you from Curacao.
My much missed wife finally joined me on board the ship. Apart from all the other good things that resulted from that, one of the good things was that I also got a huge pile of correspondence, from you good people, that had piled at home.
I must say that I am very gratified by the nice stamps & stuff that I received & thank you all.
One of the stunning sheets that I received from my "newly good friend" from Thailand, Charlie, is put up with this post.
I do a bit of Scuba diving as well and even otherwise, this is a great sheet. Seen in the sheet are in the clockwise direction (only the species that I recognised), the manta Rays, Groupers, Napoleon fish (??), puffer fish, Octopus, Leopard Shark & a
Sea Turtle. And in the middle row we have the beautiful Sail fish & the Scorpion Fish (??). I have some great snap of this one in my comp some where. Let me see if I can dig it up later for you all.
So thanks again you all. And Charlie, your sheet is already on the way. Hope you get it soon.
People rarely came bigger then Davy crockett then & they don't come any bigger now. Somehow, this stamp seems fitting. Not the idolising stmap splashed with colors & slayed with an American flag as they seem wont to do these days.
A couple of days back I had written on my main blog about the Mona passage & entering the Carribians. In the spirit of these Islands & my current location, I wanted to show you this beautiful sheet from Anguilla showing six stamps with the views & the
maps. I'm sorry that I can't show you a better scan of the thing, but the sheet is really beautiful.
The sheet is also dear to me because my wife Puja gave it to me on my last birthday. Another reason why I'm putting this here, is because I'm missing her a lot these days out here. All the sun & sand & the warm breeze. If only she was here, she would
have chilled a nice beer.
Love you babe.
Please also note the excellent postmark from "Takanawa Japan". Also the steam coming out from near the wheels is a neat thing.
Thanks Mary.
I reached the Islands of the Netherlands Antilles today. The Netherlands Antilles comprise of three Islands off the North Coast of Venezuela named "Aruba, Bonaire & Curacao" , also called the ABC Islands around these parts.
I was going through my old port papers & came across this stamp in the papers. I suppose that it is a revenue stamp of the area, but I can't be very sure. The year of print isn't given, but I don't suppose that it would be more then a couple of years
old.
I had always thought that these Islands were a protectorate of the Netherlands and had assumed that they must be using Dutch stamps. But evidently they don't use dutch ones & have some stamps of their own.
I am not very sure, but from the Sailing directions on board my ship, this looks like the harbour view of the Willemstad port in Curacao. A good classic looking stamp, but I hope they have some colorful stamps as well!
Lamborama from postcrossing sent me across this set of X men stamps. Now wolverine is one chap that that we haven't corrupted with our politically correct concepts of metrosexual superheros. He keeps running after one woman like all decent men should &
keeps cutting people up with his blades like all decent heros should.
Its probably a good thing they dropped the lame costume for the movie.
The ship left US & we are on the way to Curacao. Wanted to say that I'll post tomorrow. Too tired today. Just wanted to thank Eric. Got a message from Home that you sent a stunning cover. Can hardly wait to get my hands on it.
Thanks again.
I have been to Japan of course a few times but never really roamed much in the countryside. When I used to go to Japan in the cargo ships in the 1990's, we would stay in ports like Yokohama & Nagoya for up to four days. The best part of Japan was that
they used to work only two shifts. So you would have the night shift from 2000 Hrs to 0600Hrs without cargo. Once we got together with a bulk carrier in front of us & played a game of Cricket in one of their empty hatches. It was a grand game and we
were totally routed. But then they were good hosts & great many toasts were raised in the cool night of Nagoya.
It was a good night in a good country.
Recently I received three great sets of train postage stamps from Tamayo. I am only showing you two sets today because I am posting very low resolution pictures via email & it's a bit difficult to make out if all three sets are shown together. I am not
a great train enthusiast and wouldn't be able to tell you much about these trains but the postage stamps are very beautiful and it would be great to get my hands on the complete set.
The ones on the left with all the steam bellowing out of then are obviously my favorites. Sadly the postmark, usually of very clear quality in Japan, is not very good here so it's a bit hard to figure out.
Enough of the capitalist super heros of the west. Let us today look at cartoons of the Czech Republic. These stamps were also sent to me by Lenka. If you remember, I had earlier put up an stamp of the Dinosaur that he had sent. Lenka Assures me that
these cartoons are popular in his homeland, but I sadly don't have much info about them. But I do recollect seeing movie cartoons of the mole on the right as a kid. In the eighties, the cartoons available in India were still a lot from the USSR & I do
remember the silent cartoons with the mole going about his daily life.
So thanks for the card & the stamps Lenka. J
PS: Please note the nice Praha postmark.
Let us look at another set of superhero stamps since they were fixed on the same envelope that Laura had sent across. The envelope picked up a little dirt in the corner, but I didn't cut it off. I think the superheroes need to get themselves dirty once
in a while. J
The set has this to speak about the Comic cover art:
"Amazing Spiderman : #1 , March 1963. Art By Jack Kirby & Steve Ditko. Peter begins to worry about money now that Uncle Ben is gone. The first headline warning readers about the "Spider man Menace" runs in the Daily Bugle. And Gullible old Aunt May
gets drawn into complaining about that "horrible Spiderman"
This cover also features the Fantastic four. They seem to be the only superheros featured in two of the stamps.
To be frank I used to like Spider-Man before the movies came out. There was a time when we could trust superheroes. These days they seem to be fighting their personal demons more then the ones out there. Spider-man seems to keep moping about some thing
or the other. Superman in the new movie isn't any better. And our "Manly monster" Hulk was the most depressing superhero portrayed on screen.
Give me a break! You are a superhero. Pick up that school bus & hit someone on the head with it!
GPS :32 39N ,079 15W
About the hulk postage stamp of yesterdays post, on the comic cover art, they had posed a question. "Is he a man or monster? Or Both?"
Does that make hulk a "manly monster" ?
