Spills and Spiels

my cup runneth over — it just has to spill somewhere

Postcards from the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories June 6, 2011

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 5:56 am
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My friend Mia and I have been avid postcrossers since last year.

However, we’ve grown a bit tired of the usual scenic postcards we get in our countries that she asked if I wanted to buy some postcards from the US.  I said YES!  One of the sets we got were the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories.  Here’s my half of the postcards:

I wanted to be selfish and just keep this all to myself but where’s the fun in that, right?  But I think I’ll keep one — The Secret of the Old Clock — the first Nancy Drew book that I read.

Cheers to Postcrossing!

 

100 Postcards November 11, 2010

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 7:37 am
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Oregon (my 100th postcard)

Exactly 119 days ago, I joined Postcrossing.  What a truly interesting way to meet people around the globe by swapping postcards.  And what better to capture the essence of a place you haven’t been to but through the handpicked postcard sent by another postcrosser.

Postcrossing-wise, I have only received 36 postcards (and sent the same number).  But through direct swaps (that wouldn’t have been possible without Postcrossing), I have collected a total of 100 postcards.  This Oregon postcard is from a stay-at-home mom of 3.

So far, I have received postcards from 32 countries and I can’t wait to receive more!

Interestingly, hubby and I just got back from watching a movie (YUP WE WATCHED A MOVIE!  But that’s another story.) — R.E.D. today.  I loved every time they would use a postcard as a segue way to another scene!  So cool!  Then when I got home, 4 postcards greeted me in our mailbox!  How apt!

Together with the Oregon postcard, I received one postcard each from Canada, Philippines (Thanks Mia), and India!

Here they are:

The Taj Mahal (my 1st postcard from India)

Striated Grassbird from the Philippines through Mia

CN Tower from Canada

Check out my postcard album.

 

Happy Mailbox! August 18, 2010

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 12:28 am
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from Germany

My mailbox has been feeling pretty lonely and empty for the past week that it was a joy to suddenly receive 3 postcards again, all at the same time!  I think our mailman doesn’t visit our place daily so I guess the post office hold up most of our mail for a number of days before actually delivering.

I’ll take a photo of our mailbox one of these days so you can see how hungry it looked. :P  I actually left a letter in the mailbox << one of ‘em advertisements about pre-school which we are not yet looking into.

The trouble with the post office here is that at least the only place I know that’ll take my letters and postcards is the one in District 1.  There’s no post office here in District 7!  I even called up directory assistance so they can direct me to one but I found out there’s none! :(  Such a hassle to go to District 1 every time I want to send a letter!  So now, the only way I can send is after I go to Sunday Mass or when I happen to be in District 1 for shopping or work.  I’m kinda excited going back to work actually coz it means I can drop by the P.O. during lunch time.  Postcrossing addict much? :P

Actually, not so much.  Haha.  Yeah right.  I can actually hear Manuel reminding me not to be OVERLY excited about sending postcards and scheduling our weekend trips to District 1 around getting to the post office. :P  This reminds me when we were in Malaysia and all I did was try to find a post office.  Unfortunately, all the signs in one mail office were in Malay that I couldn’t understand what to do and I was kinda embarrassed to ask around so I ended up sending the mail during the 2nd to the last day of our vacation in KL Sentral Market.

Out of the 7 postcards I’ll be sending this weekend, only 2 are “legitimately” for Postcrossing,  2 are personal mails and the other 3 are direct swaps of people I met through Postcrossing (Afghanistan, Lithuania, and Spain).  Isn’t that interesting?

What I love about this is suddenly, I’m getting in touch with my friends back home and abroad again — asking for their addresses.  When was the last time someone asked for your address to send you a letter?  I bet it has been a while, right?  And what’s cool about postcards is that if you run out of things to say, just tell something about the snapshot in the card and you’ll be alright.

Here’s 2 more of the postcards I received this week:

from Portugal

from Texas, USA

 

Jobless No More! August 12, 2010

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 4:45 pm
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Yup!  You read it right.  I just got out of retirement.  Technically, I’ll be back to the workforce in 2 weeks time.  It’s only on a part time basis —- I know, I know you are probably wondering why this deserves an entry when it’s only part time work which I have been already doing since I got here in Vietnam >> freelance writing, real estate, and selling (online and offline).  This one deserves an entry because I’ll be going back to the office reporting to a regular boss.  This means waking up early to commute and dealing with Ho Chi Minh traffic.  This also means that I’d have to leave Sam with a sitter the whole day which I’m not really keen on doing.  :(  That is why I requested for part time work because I’m having separation anxiety.

I am lucky that I really don’t need to work because hubby is earning okay for our family BUT there’s that nagger in my mind prodding me to find relevant work experience here in Vietnam.  Also, it would be nice earning money to buy hubby gifts and stuff that really came from ME and not just from what I saved up from our budget. Time and again, I’ve read about homemakers shouldn’t feel guilty about spending their husbands’ money for themselves —- well I really don’t (HAHA!) but having extra makes me feel better.  And I have to face it that when after hubby’s stint here in Vietnam and we need to head back to Pinas, we won’t be able to make it as one-income family.  Might as well firm up the resume.  It can be quite difficult to explain why there’s a 3 year void in my work experience when I start looking for work again back home.

And to top this day off (after getting the job), I got 3 more postcards through Postcrossing!  2 are from strangers while 1 is through direct swap:

from Finland via direct swap

from Austria

from New London, Connecticut, USA

 

I finally received my first postcard! August 10, 2010

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 8:17 am
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HK Postcard via Postcrossing

As soon as we got off the taxi cab from the airport (we just got back from a trip to Malaysia), I quickly checked our mailbox!  And true enough, there lay my first ever postcard through Postcrossing.com.  It has been less than a month since I joined Postcrossing so I was pretty surprised to get a postcard.  Needless to say it came from HK from a 21-year old girl named KA.

What a great way to welcome me back to Vietnam!

I kinda went overboard in postcard shopping in Malaysia.  I even found a shop selling Philippine postcards so I had to get some of those too.  :)  Good thing I did because a young boy named Salvador from Colombia wants to know more about Pinas and Vietnam.

Hopefully, I get to expose Sam too in the joys of snail mailing. ;)

 

Photographs, Postcards, and Memories July 25, 2010

Filed under: Spills — Lyra @ 5:18 am
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Postcards form Nam

I love collecting memorabilia from different places I visit or other people I know visited.  My number one favorite to collect are bookmarks (which I left in the Philippines).  That interest began when my ninang from the US sent me one of those gold metal type of bookmarks.  Since then, wherever I go I try to acquire more bookmarks that shows local color.

I tried collecting boomerangs from Australia and so far, I have two.  Not much luck there, eh?

So anyhoo, another favorite are postcards.  Lotsa, lotsa postcards.  I have postcards of cities and provinces I visited.  And luckily, I stumbled upon Postcrossing through a friend, Djong Tan in Facebook.  Now my postcards have somewhere to go!  I so love the idea of Postcrossing and the fact that you may get a REAL postcard in your mailbox sounds wonderful!

I have always lamented to my friend, Ging that we don’t get real mail anymore.  Now, I’m excited to go to the Post Office to send my postcards to people around the world (so far I’ve sent a couple to The Netherlands, Belarus, Czech Republic, UK, and the US).  I just joined Postcrossing last week and just yesterday, I found out that 2 people have already received the postcards I sent.  Hopefully, I’d get one in the mail soon too!

At least now, I wouldn’t only be getting billing statements in my mailbox!  Thank God for Postcrossing! :)

 

 
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