Postcrossing Update

May 1st, 2024

It’s been over six months since I last posted about Postcrossing, so now seems like a good time for an update.

As you can see, I’ve now sent and received about 1150 card, and my monthly activity seems to be on the rise. I usually ‘do postcrossing’ every two weeks, writing about 10-20 cards every time. It’s time consuming and a bit expensive, but it’s always fun getting new cards in my post box.

Here’s the updates on the top sent and received countries where you can see just how much the service is dominated by Germany:

On the other end of the list, here are the countries to which I have only sent a single card: Albania, Algeria, Bangladesh, Costa Rica, Cyprus, French Guiana, Guernsey, Jordan, Kosovo, Malta and Reunion. (I also sent a single card to South Africa but it never arrived.)

And here the countries from which I have only received a single card: Asland Islands, South Africa, Croatia, Denmark, Israel, Armenia, Bahamas, Guam, Morocco, Puerto Rico and Sri Lanka.

The above are the approximately 400 cards received since my last update. It’s always a surprise to see what sorts of cards people send – and what they write on the back – and they range across every possible type of design.

My profile says I like vintage cards and I get a lot of them (like the German one in the bottom left from the 60s) but I also get an increasing amount of cards with art or non location-specific themes, which is likely because tourist postcard printing is on the decline in most countries.

The one on the right above has an actual signature on it of a Czech actor/singer. The message on the back humorously describes her as ‘not famous’ but a quick Google search showed she was indeed in a few films. Apparently the sender got the card at a concert she was giving.

Here’s the most unusual card I received in the last six months:

Yes, that’s the front of the card! It was send from Canada. If you saw this, would you buy and mail it to someone? (I would!)

As for stamps, I recently changed my profile to say I like ‘unusual’ stamps and it seems to have had an effect on the amount of non-rectangular stamps I’ve been receiving:

Most are from Finland, and it seems their post office can’t not release unusually shaped stamps! The two at the top are particular notable: could the one on the left be the only instance of a Commodore 64 on a stamp? The bottom right image is of a lovely wax seal which survived the post completely intact. Maybe it’s time for me to dig out my wax seal kit again…

In other stamp news, I got one of the UK Bowie stamps, an unusual stamp of a singer (?) from Taiwan, and my first King Charles ‘machen’ stamp! The low denomination Canadian stamps are nice as well, especially since most stamps from that country are fairly mundane.

Russia and China also continued their silent war of who can release the largest stamps. Every one of the above is larger than any US stamp I have ever seen – in some cases two or three times larger. It may seem like China is winning from the above pic but take a look at this beauty:

Yes, that’s almost the entire back of the postcard with a single stamp on it! You can see they used the remaining 8 mm of space at left to write a short message and my address. This sender couldn’t have possibly known of my endless quest to fill the majority of the back of a card with stamps, and in one fell blow has surpassed my greatest effort. This is a card that will live in my memory forever!

Posted in Postcards, Stamps | 2 Comments »

LEGO R2-D2

April 28th, 2024

I recently bought and assembled this guy:

It’s a brand new model of R2-D2. Here’s what was inside the box:

About 1000 pieces and some stickers. A quick build therefore, and a less expensive one (even at $99). He went together easily and his main body is about as big as a rockmelon:

Construction is somewhat repetitive, but utilizes clever techniques to (mostly) hide the studs. He’s very solid too.

He has a few display modes once completed. Here he is with all his contraptions in use:

And here he is with his third leg, which is probably how I’ll display him:

I like this kit! At about 29 cm it’s not too big so it can be displayed even on a shelf, and considering the size it’s both poseable and a good likeness of everyone favourite droid.

LEGO has done two other versions over the years (excluding a terrible technic one 25 years ago), but they’re both more expensive and much bigger. Here they are:

The ultimate one on the right certainly looks great, but it’s also twice the size of the little guy I built so displaying it would be a problem which is why I never bought it.

I’m glad they made this new one. He’s cute 🙂

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Ramen Universes Beyond: Pusheen

April 23rd, 2024

If you’re keeping track, this is the 5th ‘Universes Beyond’ post and the 31st ramen-related post! What do we have today? This:

Pusheen is a character created in 2010 by an American illustrator. In the years since the fat fluffy cat has become heavily merchandised and there’s a large array of Pusheen items available today. Apparently he’s big enough he now has his own ramen!

You can clearly say the package is labeled ‘chicken ramen‘, but when I opened it I found this:

That’s not ramen! Those are pho noodles, and since I’ve never tried a chicken pho that I liked I was immediately suspicious of this incorrectly labeled product.

I followed the sparse instructions and – like most other instant pho soups I’ve tried – the noodles hardly softened. My suspicion only deepened since the smell was abhorrent, but I sealed it and let it steep another few minutes.

Eventually it was time to sample it and – surprise, surprise – the taste was reminiscent of weeds and the noodles had the consistency of elastic bands. A dreadful product, not even worth 1% of the $4.99 I paid for it. Pusheen can go to hell!

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The Circus

April 21st, 2024

We just got back from a Cirque du Soleil performance at our downtown arena. It was completely free, since Kristin’s work had booked an entire performance for their employees!

As you no doubt know, Cirque du Soleil is a modern circus that has character and story-driven shows and no animals. Tonight’s show was Corteo, about a clown viewing his own funeral. It was comedic and celebratory, and has apparently been performed over 5000 times in 17 years of touring since its debut almost 20 years ago!

That was our view. The arena was split down the middle with the large stage, and the audience sat on either side. When the action began the curtains lifted and it looked like this:

But I’m ahead of myself, since I forgot to mention that thanks to Kristin’s work both parking and food was also free, which means we didn’t have to pay the insane costs for fries and hotdogs ourself!

The performance was wonderful. With live music and singing and every sort of gymnastic event you could imagine it was a fascinating couple of hours.

The round stage rotated, and almost every act included some sort of aerial element. The most impressive for me were the solo artistes, like this ‘aerial silk’ girl (who had phenomenal shoulder/arm muscles!):

Or the freestanding laddersman:

Or the elastic strapmaster, whose body seemed like it was 110% muscle:

In the above photo the stairs you can see in the background are the opposite side of the arena.

Every main act was interspersed with a modern take on a clown show, which were amusing distractions as they set the stage for the next gymnast. Plus, they had pantomime horses:

We also saw trapeze artists, jugglers, diabolo savants, cyr wheel masters and lots of girls swinging from chandeliers. It was a lot of fun 🙂

Thanks Regeneron!

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Clear Files

April 16th, 2024

A ubiquitous type of Japanese collectible is the ‘clear file’. A plastic, printed equivalent to the ‘manila folder’ of the west, these are the cheapest example of otaku/anime merchandise and are available seemingly everywhere in Japan.

The most common type is shown above: a piece of printed thin plastic folded and sealed at one end to create a folder that opens diagonally. As with most merchandise in Japan, the manufacturing is top-notch, and they have a great smooth feel in your hands and the print quality is super high.

Over the many years we’ve been traveling to Japan we’ve been accumulating these, and now have almost 100. The above photo shows the variety of sizes we own, with the most common being the two in the top left, which are A4 (the kimono girl) and slightly larger. I’m sure there are many more sizes than those shown above – I’ve seen a few as big as a wall poster! – but easily 75% of ours are A4 size.

A decent selection of ours were ‘free’, such as the two above which were bonuses for buying packs of gum/chocolate at convenience stores. If I’m ever in a ‘konbini’ and they have a clear file offer, I’ll bend over backwards to buy whatever it takes to get the file. And no, I don’t know who the people on the above are either!

We have dozens of clear files showing pretty models, which frequently come free with manga magazines. When they do, it doesn’t raise the price of the magazine, which shows how cheap and disposable these things are.

They are frequently given as bonus items when you purchase games, such as the above that came with a Switch game. More than once I’ve been checking out in a Japanese shop and seen a pile of files behind the counter and seriously considered buying the game just to get one.

Girl models aside, the majority of ours are anime related, but files are available for just about anything it seems. There’s a very good chance I’ve bought you one (or more!) of these over the years, and I know such purchases have included animals (squirrels, owls), trains, food and Japanese scenic photos.

I bought the above at the Cup Noodles store in Yokohama. In fact I almost always buy a clear file when I’m in a souvenir shop since they can be so inexpensive: often only a few dollars.

The above is very clever. While I don’t play the Yu-Gi-Oh card game, I love that they made this file to look like a giant card. I wish they’d make a MtG basic land into a clear file!

Earlier this year at the Osaka Ultraman store I spent enough yen that I got to play a bonus game where I had to shoot a little dart gun at a target board. I won the above pop-art clear file of an alien in the Ultraman universe 🙂

Several years ago when we saw NJPW at Tokyo Dome, the above was a freebie if you signed up for life insurance. I played the dumb foreigner and successfully talked my way into a free one! The signature is a facsimile, and ever since getting this KLS and I have nicknamed this wrestler ‘clear file’.

Clear files are often prizes in Ichiban Kuji lotteries (which probably deserve a post of their own one day), and we have quite a few such as the G prize from a recent Uma Musume Kuji.

The above is a girl from the K-Pop band Twice. Bernard bought me this when we were last in Japan together, and one day when he has long forgotten about it I’ll send it to him for Christmas 🙂

Clear files are also available in gacha machines, and the above are two examples (the right is Shin Godzilla). These machines have evolved over the years, and these days the files they vend are usually A4 size.

If you thought the gacha ones looked impractically small, look at the above! This came in a blind pack with a stick of gum, sold like trading cards. The file is so small it can’t even hold a single cheque (remember them?); what’s this supposed to be used for?!

As far as favourites are concerned I have two. The first is the above Puzzdra file sent to me by Adam’s alliteratively-named sister AC. For a game as popular and long-lasting as Puzzdra there’s a dearth of merchandise and this file is special for that reason.

And no surprises I love the above. I really should get some more Ultraman files…

The most recent one we’ve obtained is the above, which came free with a manga weekly I bought in Japan. I’ve never heard of the series, and the mag was long tossed, but of course this file will remain in our ‘collection’ forever.

Oh, and I actually use these things! In fact this post was motivated by me replacing a very worn out one I use for school with a new one (above) taken from our collection 🙂

Posted in Art, Collecting, Miscellaneous, Otaku | Comments Closed

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