Mails from Chile

By ilyani | Published 1 February, 2009

I have got two wonderful Chile cards so far, which makes me feel blessed enough. Unlike Brazil, I don’t get to come across many Postcrossers from Chile in the forum hence the less chances to get a piece of postcard from there. And I have to say my two Chile postcards are GREAT!

Sent by Lukwa

Sent by Lukwa

Lukwa sent me these scarily funny looking statues in the Easter Island (Rapa Nui) which are called Moai. They are human figures carved from rocks between year 1250 and 1500 AD. This brilliant postcard made me recall that I used to see an image of these statutes in my childhood book.. hmm no wonder they look familar. And now that I am writing this I just have to go and dig out the book to check! :P *will be back in seconds*.

Hahaha now this is getting more interesting. How could I forget that I used to have the knowledge about Easter Island when I was 7 years old?? :D Okay, it’s fun to read again the article in a simple Malay for kids which I translate into English here.

Easter Island which is located in the South Pacific is a volcanic island founded by a Dutch sailor Jacob Roggeveen. This island which is founded in year 1722 is 17.1km long and 8.05 km wide. A weird thing about this island is the rows of head figures made of rock, which were built facing the sea. Who made these figures and when they built them, nobody knows. These figures were built with volcanic rock and their heights are between 266cm to 610cm. Some of the heads wear a hat made of red colored volcanic lava.

Read more about Moai. I find it really interesting.

Sent by Orianofla

Sent by Orianofla

Okay and my second card from Chile came from Oriana. It shows the beautiful Valparaiso city, one of South America’s busiest Pacific Ocean ports and a major tourist stop off. It has rich architecture composition with colorful houses (so pretty!) and needless to say this city is listed in the UNESCO World Heritage.

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Ljubljana

By ilyani | Published 1 February, 2009

I have come to hear the name of this capital city of Slovenia only after Postcrossing. Even I had no idea where Slovenia was located back then even though I used to know its name. And talking about Ljubljana, it’s pretty good that I at least have a little idea on how South Slavic language pronounces J (which sounds as English Y), otherwise I can’t imagine myself trying to read the name of this city. “Ljubav” means love, which I wonder if this city’s name is meant to have something to do with love.

This postcard came from Vesna74 showing the old part of Ljubljana. I find it pretty that the buildings have similar looking color of rooftop. Except maybe the green-domed St. Nicholas Cathedral.

Another view of Ljubljana I receive from Athena125 (which recently came to Malaysia and sent me a Malaysian card from here lol!). On this card she wrote that the river which runs through the main part of the city is called Ljubljanica.

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Greetings from the Twentieth Century

By ilyani | Published 1 February, 2009

I have come to receive free/ads cards sometimes, and I am fine with free cards if they are interesting. For example, Boomerang cards published in The Netherlands are really aweseome. I received two postcards from the series Greetings from the Twentieth Century from laverne616. I wish I could get all from the series, or at least I could find them on a website or something (anyone can help me?). Okay so these cards are basically showing the most significant events happening throughout every decade of the 20th century. I’ll write down the description printed on the cards here.

1930-1940. 4th December 1931, Mahatma Ghandi outside 10 Downing Street, London while attending a conference of Indian constitutional reform. His long, non-violent struggle played a big part in paving the way for Indian Independence in 1947. I think Mahatma Ghandi is a very cool and down to earth person. Look he’s wearing his own piece of Indian clothings in a really important conference in London!

1970-1980. 11th December 1978, one of the many demonstrations for the return of religious leader Ayatollah Khomeiny to Iran. With the return of Khomeiny on the 1st February 1979 Iran becam a fundamentalist Islamic state after many months of chaos. I just had to get this card when it was offered in a tag because I have a thing about Iran ever since I visited the country in 1999. I don’t really understand myself the meaning of fundamentalist, and I’m not interested to comment political-wise, but in the sense of culture they’re original as they are really what they are, pure Persian lifestyle still strongly remains and hardly influenced by the outsiders or Westerners. Unlike Malaysians – we are always so proud to worship the West! :P

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