I’ve written about my love affair with Postcrossing a few times (here, here, and here) and while the past year I haven’t kept up with sending as many cards I love the fact that I still continue to be surprised when one pops up in my mailbox.  Another great thing is that I can pick up and right where I left off and I wrote five postcards yesterday.

For every card that tells me a little about their life or just says hello because they don’t write English, there are those that tell me how their hobbies and interests intersect my own. It’s comforting to know that in this crazy world we are not all as different as we sometimes think we are.  And sometimes I receive postcards like this, from strangers who bring war and conflict closer to home.

I’ve received a few more like this from Kiev over the past year and it has definitely made me feel more connected to the people there and what it going on internationally.  Interestingly, I’ve received more postcards from Russia and it is never mentioned.

These are the countries I received cards from and the average length of time it took for them to get to me.

• Postcards by country

• 		Country	Received	Avg travel (Received)
  1		Australia	5	8 days
  2		Belarus	12	27 days
  3		Belgium	1	6 days
  4		Brazil	1	92 days
  5		Canada	1	10 days
  6		China	10	24 days
  7		Czech Republic	5	15 days
  8		Dominican Republic	1	45 days
  9		Estonia	2	10 days
  10		Finland	8	9 days
  11		France	2	54 days
  12		Germany	28	14 days
  13		Hong Kong	5	14 days
  14		Iceland	1	14 days
  15		India	3	11 days
  16		Indonesia	1	25 days
  17		Ireland	1	3 days
  18		Israel	1	19 days
  19		Japan	3	13 days
  20		Korea (South)	2	13 days
  21		Latvia	1	16 days
  22		Lithuania	2	16 days
  23		Morocco	1	9 days
  24		Netherlands	23	10 days
  25		New Zealand	2	16 days
  26		Poland	9	47 days
  27		Portugal	3	22 days
  28		Russia	28	23 days
  29		Singapore	4	12 days
  30		Slovenia	2	12 days
  31		Spain	5	59 days
  32		Sweden	1	6 days
  33		Switzerland	1	9 days
  34		Taiwan	9	17 days
  35		Thailand	1	14 days
  36		Turkey	1	15 days
  37		U.S.A.	22	12 days
  38		Ukraine	11	26 days
  39		United Kingdom	3	11 days

  Of the 222 cards I’ve only received one set of repeats.

  Appropriate, right?  One is from Germany and the other from the Netherlands.

  If you want to keep up with the postcards I receive you can visit the blog I’ve set up, Postcarder

  And if you are interesting in giving it a try yourself I can’t recommend it enough! It’s fun, easy and a cheap way to travel.  Visit Postcrossing.