New Country # 242, Royalty, Istanbul and Cannes

Well, I'm back with a number of cards , four in fact. Am I excited , you bet. I received a card from a new country in my collection, it's # 242, and it is Curacao. It is indeed a new country in the world , having just attained independence on Oct 10, 2010. So my usual compliment of four cards come from Curacao, Sweden, Turkey and France. So without further ado.....

Even though I would love to start with Curacao, I think that I should start with Sweden, since the card bears the country's royalty. Queen Silvia is featured on Miki's card. Born on 23 Dec 1943, she married the King of Sweden on 19 June 1976. Before that she was a host at the 1972 Munich Olympics, the Deputy Head of Protocol at the Winter Games in Innsbruck and even worked briefly as a flight attendant. Postcrosser Miki used 1 of 5 stamps issued this year , from a Swedish Castles booklet.

Here we go, new country # 242, Curacao. This is my first new country since early August. If I knew how, I'd insert a drum roll here. Shown on the card are a number of views of Willemstad and a number of cruise ships arriving. I owe my good fortune for this card to Alan H of Westport , CT. U.S.A. I don't know Alan, but I'm glad he knows my blog and was good enough to think of me while in Curacao. As I mentioned earlier, Curacao became independent on 10-10-10, the 10th day of the 10th month of 2010. It was formerly a part of The Netherlands Antilles. Alan used a combination of stamps on the card. The stamp on the left is a 2010 Netherlands Antilles stamp from a set of 10 fruit definitives. The stamp on the right is from the new country , Curacao, and is their first stamp issue, issued on their independence day. So not only did Alan send me a great card , but he also used a great stamp. I actually have a collection of stamp # 1's from various countries and can now add one more . I think I need another drum roll.

Let's move on to Turkey. This card shows a view of Istanbul, with The Hippodrome, The Egyptian Obelisk, Sultanahmet Mosque and Hagia Sophia. Istanbul is the largest and most populated city in Turkey, with in excess of 12.7 million people. It is located on the Bosphorus Straight. It extends both on the European and on the Asian sides of the Bosphorus, and as such is the the only city in the world that is situated on two continents. Dale, my brother , who was touring over that way, sent this card along. He used stamps from a 2009 set of 10 definitives as well as a 2010 issue , all of which featured Mustafa Kemel Ataturk. He was Turkey's first President, first Prime Minister and first Speaker of Parliament.

The final card today is from Cannes, Cote dÁzur, France. Cannes is one of the best known cities of the French Riviera. It is a busy tourist destination and host of the annual Cannes Film Festival. This is another card from Dale, see above. He toured the medieval walled town of Saint Paul de Vence, famous for Marc Chagall , among others, having lived there. Dale used a Marianne definitive on this one.

I hope to get one more card from Dale's trip overseas, maybe from Morocco . He has since returned to this side of the world, arriving in Brazil 2 days ago. He left today from Rio de Janeiro, sailing south to Montevideo, Stanley in The Falklands, Antarctica, Ushuaia and Punta Arenas. You can be sure that I'll be looking in the mail box during the next month or so.

All in all I think this was a pretty good update. Any update of a new country is a good one for me. Thanks to Miki, Alan, and Dale for their cards. Alan, as noted on this blog, you can expect a thank you postcard soon. Comments ?