Radom, Poland

A card coming from the Polish town of Radom, showing the Garrison Church...

The church is located in the Constitution Square and was formerly an Orthodox church....there is just some information in Polish about this church, but not really in English...

from the set of 3 Christmas stamps issued in 2015

Leżajsk, Poland

Last card for today brings us this snowy view from Poland, showing the Bernardine Fathers Basilica in Leżajsk.

The current Bernardine church was erected in the years 1618–1628. It was founded by Łukasz Bnin Opaliński, the Great Marshall of the Crown and his wife, Anna from the Pilecki family. The church was built in the place, where, according to the legend, in 1590 Tomasz Michałek saw the Virgin Mary with St. Joseph. In 1594, a wooden church was built in the place of revelation, and 16 years later, the first stone church was erected by the Bernardines, who came here from Przeworsk in 1608.

the stamp is a definitive issued in 1996.

enjoy the rest of the weekend everyone! and see you around =)

Moszna, Poland

last card for today comes from Poland, showing the beautiful Moszna castle.

I dont know if some photoshop has interfered here but however, the card is just lovely, and i absolutely love the colours!
Moszna is a small village in south-west Poland. The castle was built in the 17th century and it's reminiscent of the English castles from the Elizabethan period. The castle has as many chambers as there are days in the calendar.
The castle has a chapel which is also used as a concert hall. Since 1998 the building houses a gallery, in which works of various artists are presented at regular exhibitions.
It is one of the best known monuments in the western part of Upper Silesia.

Another one, fairy-tale like card :)

the stamp is from the 2011 EUROPA series, representing forests .

thanks for reading and dropping by...and...see you again, sooner or later

Wieliczka, Poland

well, as you may probably know, I spent the New Year holidays in Poland, Kraków in particularly...so it is safe I guess to post this, without ruining a surprise :) though in case you get a card from Kraków with only an address label and a stamp, and everything else is blank, not even a signature,  know that it is from me...believe it or not, one like that ended up in Croatia...I just hope there are no other cards with the same destiny...really embarrassing!
My initial intention was to actually send cards from here...but fortunately i decided to send them from Kraków instead, coz here i only had like 5 min. free, and it would have been impossible to send anything, and I would have ended up sending nothing...erm...i just managed to send one to myself...ok ok, dont shoot me..sorry...but i had to enrich my UNESCO collection among else

well, ill give you my impressions about Kraków some other time...this time im gonna present you the Wieliczka Salt Mine...a place you MUST visit in case you have the chance! A really fascinating place, built in the 13th century, believe it or not and producing table salt until 2007. The depth goes beyond 300m (visitors are allowed until 110m below ground), while the total length of its tunnels is over 300km...can you imagine?
The choice of cards was rather poor, but i got two....above you can see the Kunegunda shaft bottom (depth 90.8 m.)...where there are rock sculptures showing a group of gnomes who are believed to have helped the Wieliczka miners. You have no idea how real these sculptures are portrayed..
The shaft was used to transport the produce from chambers situated on the Upper Level II to Level I. The figures depict, among others, a crusher, a carrier, a cart driver and a carpenter.
btw, you are allowed to lick the salt off the walls....though i would recommend the ceiling...out of hygienic reasons ;)

this second card shows the beautiful timber of St. John's chapel (135m underground ) which is considered to be the mine’s most beautiful wooden chapel. Unfortunately, we didnt get the chance to see it...though with what ive seen i was more than impressed.

it is funny, but inside the mine they organize weddings, parties, new year celebrations....luckily the guests can use the elevators...otherwise i can imagine a bride on high-heels and a long veil, going down the stairs made of salt :P

probably the most impressive to me was St. Kinga's Chapel...after moving through dark narrow halls, this grand area appears in front of you...you cant not be fascinated with it! Too bad I have no postcard of it to show it to you, but feel free to browse the net....

now, the special thing about this mine is that you can actually mail a postcard from down there, using a special postmark...and i just had to sneak one in, in those 5 minutes i had available...as you can see, im not very savvy at placing postmarks properly but at least it is there :)  Funny fact - i mailed the card on 2 January...there is a second cancellation above, dating from 16 January.... i dont know if they maybe empty the mailbox every fortnight or this card has gotten stuck somewhere, but those two weeks will definitely remain mysterious. Once I mailed it I actually wondered why i hadnt just taken the card with me instead risk sending it, but you know it always feels more special when a card has travelled :)

and unlike at the post office in Kraków, here they didnt sell the famous 3zl stamps (which are considered as priority stamps), but here you get the economy 2.40 zl ones...and this one was issued in 2011 as a Christmas stamp in a set of two.

Thanks a lot to me, myself and I for these cards :)

Auschwitz-Birkenau, Poland

Ive already posted about Auschwitz, but I wanted to show this card too, since it comes from my favourites

i dont know why, cards from places like this induce some mixed emotions....maybe due to such deeply-buried mysteriousness is why i find such cards so appealing...i mean, im not a freak or anything who is fascinated by death and concentration camps...I just find such places so surreal and can never really know what actually happened...coz the media and all the other sources will serve you different sides of the story...which one you end up believing in, is totally up to you...

Might be coz of the rails why I also really love this card :)

the stamp was issued in 2009, commemorating the World Postal Day

Czartowe Pole, Poland

well, my last card for today will take you to Poland and to the Czartowe Pole reserve...and this should be the Sopot river...though I might be wrong about it...

btw, today im also trying to learn how this the new blogger functions...I cant tell if I like it better or not...im still not used to it so seems a bit complicated at moments and not so user-friendly...esp. when it comes to the posts and typing...the previous way this functioned was better for me, and Ill never understand why when something is working well, changes have to be made to it...but well, I guess it only takes time to get used to something and eventually you wont even notice the new stuff and will forget about the previous layout and all...

well, I better get down to some house errands....stay well and hopefully see you again soon :) And enjoy the weekend!

Wisła, Poland

Oh yes...we cant go without a train :)

this train is in the city of Wisła, which is a small Polish city near the border with Czech Republic. Wisła is the Polish name for the Vistula River, which has its source in the mountains near the town.
Wisła is a popular year-round tourist destination, with the nearby mountains favored by ski jumpers. It is known for being the home town of ski jumper Adam Małysz, and for the fact that it is the only town in Poland with a majority Protestant population.

with all due respect to Adam, but ive never heard of him...thats what happens when tennis takes up most of the 'sport-watching' time

yes, you know the stamp...i know you do! :)

Gdansk, Poland

Such a lovely scene!

The card shows Mariacka street, which is considered to be the most romantic street in Gdansk.
Well, with all this snow and in this light of the photograph, it certainly feels romantic.

And somebody even decided to make a video about it, during daylight and post it...so by the time you get your chance to walk this street, here is one minute of it

a rather appropriate stamp with all that snow above...a Christmas one from a set of two issued in 2009

Poland

Emilia sent me this great card from Poland, which is like 3 in 1, since apart from being a map, it is also a flag and shows the Coats of Arms.

The card represents the 16 voivodeships of Poland.... is a type of administrative division dating to medieval Poland, Romania, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Russia and Serbia (Vojvodina), ruled by a voivode. The voivode (literally, "leader of warriors", equivalent to Dux Exercituum or Herzog) was originally the military commander next to the ruler. Well, living in Macedonia, this word is rather familiar to me due to the Vojvodina region in Serbia, but I have never really known what it actually stood for.
Until 1997, Poland had 49 voivodeships.

In case you are from Poland or know Polish or anything, here are two websites I came across not that long ago. Both are dedicated to Polish girls who are ill from leukemia and who need financial or moral support from others. In case you can or want to help, then just click here:
Lenka
Paulina

I dont know these two girls, but I just felt that the least I could do for them is spread the word around.

the well known Polish stamp from 2001 representing Farms.

Krakow, Poland

Well, due to the latest events, another kind of a commemorative post.

This time dedicated to the recent plane crash where the Polish President Lech Kaczyński, his wife Maria, and 94 other people, lost their lives....on the ironic side, the most important were on that plane...there were no survivors. The criticism stays of why so many important people were allowed on the same plane..as well as the potential conspiracy issues....funny thing is, i usually go with the latter...i dont know...thats just me...and after reading a LOT about conspiracy issues in just every day life and brain washing of all kind, i just dont find it impossible at all...but eventually, when you lose so many lives, it doesnt matter what the reasons where....coz you have the terrible outcomes you cant mend.
This in a great deal reminded me of 2004 when we lost our President in a plane-crash in 2004....even the image of the place of the accident looked so familiar.... so unfortunately i do have the idea how the Polish nation felt with all this...and just want to express my condolences to those i havent yet.

well, there is a stamp on the card too...so it is worth the mentioning....even though you are not unfamiliar with it...it was issued in 2001 in a set of 2 stamps representing Farms

Malbork, Poland

This is a new UNESCO whs for my collection thanks to dear Rafal :) The "guilty" one for the continuing Slavic RR addiction :)

The Castle in Malbork was built in Prussia by the Teutonic Order, a German RomanCatholic religious order, as an Ordensburg. The Order named it Marienburg, literally "Mary's Castle". The town which grew around it was also named Marienburg, and since 1945 it is known as Malbork. The castle is a classic example of a medieval fortress, and is the world’s largest brick gothic castle. UNESCO listed the castle and its museum asWorld Heritage Sites in December 1997.  It is one of two World Heritage Sites in the region with origins in the Teutonic Order. The other is the Medieval Town of Toruń, founded in 1231 as the site of the castle Thorn.

the stamp is also a nice one (well its blue :)), issued in 2007 for the 750th Anniversary of the Foundation of Cracow and shows the Coat of Arms.

Thanks a lot Rafal :)

Polish Folklore

A really lovely card that came as a real surprise from Ania in Poland...and do you wanna take a guess how many folklore cards i actually have???  *blushes*

Folklore is one of the things im not very familiar with (and which i regret not being more interested before in it....).
Here on the card are shown various traditional clothings, depending on where in Poland you are. So you have Krakow and Lublin and Tatry and Zywiec and Lowicz and Szamotuly and Kujawi and Nowy Sacz. Except for Krakow, Tatry and Lublin, the other names are absolutely new to me.
I really love all these, so nice and colourful! I think that my absolutely favourite one is the man dressed in the blue coat, from Kujawy...it doesnt even look like he is wearing traditional clothing but more like being a prince or a duke or some other high-ranked person....and i definitely also love the one on its right side, the woman on the horse...just looks so interesting with that *hat* on her head....if its a hat....but either way, its a great card, and i must say im really happy to have it....and i must admit something else...i might probably add folklore related cards to my wish list...*khm khm khm*...well, what can i do, they are really educational :)

well, first i thought of giving some video which will depict something from the Polish folklore....but since im not so familiar with it...i wanted to post something else which i think is one of the things that has left a great mark on the Polish culture...something that many generations will remember, me included....here is one of my favourite cartoons from the time when i was a kid...it may not be dealing with folklore, but still, i wanted to share it with you...plus, its dubbed in Macedonian (which i thought might be interesting for non-Macedonian speakers to listen to) with the voices of some of the most remarkable people here...the voices which will linger in the memory of many people, as a reminder of their childhood...in case there are cards with this cartoon or some other Polish/Czechoslovakian/Russian ones from the 70's/80's, id love to have them...

this great elephant stamps is from a set of 4 issued this year, under the name of "Animals of Africa".

thanks Ania a lot for sending me this card, and for actually enhancing my interest in the folklore related cards :)

Auschwitz, Poland

My last card for today comes from one of the most notorious places of the world, if i can refer to it like that.

this is what the back of the card says:

The Gate to Auschwitz II - Birkenau camp was part of the main SS guardhouse. Prisoners reffered to it as the "Gate of Death".
Not so long ago i read a book which sort of dealt with Auschwitz though it was more like a childish book, with some images embedded which really annoyed me and i thought were totally unnecessary but oh well..
And i know what im gonna just say now would seem totally insane or so, and i know its incomparable to the destiny of the people whose final life destination was here, but sometimes i feel that my own life destiny is condemned to revolve around some vicious circles from which i cant get out of....as for my current state of mind, im in a total emotional turmoil...coz of course, the jigsaws had to place themselves in a way thats the least favourable to me...im getting really tired and worn out of it...its frustrating and its sad that i always have to end up in such a situation...worst of all is that i can never actually take control of things, but they just happen, without a warning, without asking, without anything...and by the time i become aware of it, im already  inside the maze and let the currents take me as they had decided to do so...and i cant fight against it...or maybe i dont try enough...who knows...maybe its true after all that i have masochistic genes inside me...

both of the stamps here were issued in 2005. They both show Polish cities as well, but they come from different subject issues. The one on the left regards Architecture and shows the city of Sieradz, while the other one is related to history and shows the city of Sopot.

And before i disconnect....thanks for reading, and your patience and your devotion...its highly appreciated!

Gdansk, Poland

For some reason ever since i got this card, i kept referring to it as from Czech Republic...even when i scanned it, i titled it as from the Czech Republic...the same was with another card from Gdansk...if you are asking for a logical reason, i cant possibly give you one...its not even that close to the border...so i hope i wont make some silly mistake while writing this post...

On the card you can see the Dluga street, which in Polish means "long street"...which raises the similarity of Macedonian and Polish to a certain extent, since in Macedonian, 'long' means 'dolga' or 'долга'.
I like such pedestrian areas where you can walk freely without having to worry about traffic, and if cars are coming or so. And you can sit at a cafe and you wont need to breathe in the fumes and hear the traffic noise again (though people can create a great noise as well, but still, cant be compared).
Anyway, in the background, you can see the Main Town Hall...hmmm, really nice piece of architecture for a town hall i must say :)
This Gothic red brick building dates back from the 14th century and today it houses the Historical Museum of Gdansk.
Well, its just a beautiful building and thanks a lot to Ula for sending it to me :)

Poland

I doubt we'll have any snow again this winter, so i better post this card while its still eligible to represent the winter season...

This is definitely one of the loveliest, cutest, BLUEST maps ive seen! It captured my heart on first sight :)
At first i thought that it reperesnts Poland in winter, but it actually shows one of Polish regions called Malopolska (in some free translation, it would be "little Poland")...im not sure why they picked that region, instead of showing entire Poland...maybe coz the cards are printed there...another idea crossed my mind that its maybe coz this part of Poland is famous for some winter events, but then i  recalled that i had also seen this same card representing summer...so the option is out. At least ive learned that "winter" in Polish is "zima" which is the same in Macedonian (зима).
I could go and write some info about Malopolska that I have found on the net, but i thought that Ksenia may give me more info and all, and esp. im curious to know WHY this set of cards represents Malopolska only and not entire Poland :) And if there is really a card for each of the seasons...

Speaking of winter, the weather here is rather insane...yesterday i had some things to do in the afternoon, and since it was sooo nice and sunny and lovely and warm, i decided to go by bike...i dont know if Murphy simply loves experimenting on me, but in the next hour the weather drastically changed and there was such a windstorm that i feared i may not be able to come back home...and yeah, it was an experience one of a kind to cycle in that wind, blowing like crazy from all sides....and to make things more ironic, once i got home, it all calmed down...i really feel like a magnet for bad things sometimes...the rest of my evening was all down as well...people keep disappointing me...i wanted to read a book or write a letter but i just simply couldnt focus on anything...after god knows how much time, my playlist had only instrumental and classical music in it...starting from Richard Clayderman, Mozart, Schubert, Bach, Vivaldi, Rachmaninoff, Wagner, Gershwin etc etc...sometimes according to my playlist, you can figure out my current mood...

Poland

I got this card as a surprise and of course, was in total delight with it :)

This is the Polish flag, in a circled shape..it IS a circle indeed...just that whenever i scan cards, the bottom line never appears as it actually is, in case its something different than a standard flat line..
The flag of Poland consists of two horizontal stripes of equal width, the upper one white and the lower one red. The two colors are defined in the Polish Constitution as the national colours. A variant of the flag with the national coat of arms n the middle of the white stripe is legally reserved for official use abroad and at sea.

well, this one is with the coat of arms kind of flag :)

Ania, thank you soooooo immensly much for this!! Im sorry my thank-you card didnt arrive to you....but know that im really delighted and greatful you have thought of me :)

GTKY Christmas Cards

Hello Hello Hello! For the first time this year :)
Hope you have had a nice New Year's eve and that this year had a great start....mine was nice, just that it seems that i cant get enough sleep in general :)
Do you people make New Year Resolutions? I try not to, but ive made some this year, and i hope ill have the strength to stick up to them...and if you made resolutions as well, im wishing you all the necessary strength in the world so you keep up with them...*fingers crossed* :)

Well, enough chit-chat, lets show some stuff here...as its most convenient, i think, this is the time to show Christmas related stuff, no? So thats why todays posts will be all Christmas related

The first one is dedicated to the Christmas cards received through the GTKY thread....we arranged there with the ladies a nice Christmas Flamingo :) We were supposed to send each other Christmas cards, but with some rules applied...the cards HAD to be handmade and they had to have a quote/poem inside...so even though im totally anti-artistic, i decided to join, coz i knew if i didnt i would regret it...and im more than pleased to have done so....maybe my art skills suck, but what mattered eventually is the friendship...as we say, the cards were made with love, friendship, glue and paper :) So its the thought that counts....and here is what my thoughtful friends sent to me (im still waiting for the last one to arrive, and once it does, ill edit the post and post it here...)
No comments this time....i think the cards feel too personal and comments may just ruin the moment this time...so just feel the thoughtfulness and the friendship that comes along with them :)

The cards are posted in order they had been received...

from Marta in Portugal

from Essi in Finland

from Katy in Estonia

from Sally in New Zealand

from Valerie in France

from Charlotte in UK

from Carol in USA

from Ula in Poland

from Relie in Singapore
these are actually two Christmas cards, so i posted both of them

from Wendy in Jamaica

Enormous thanks my friends! Its been a pleasure to take part in this and share the Christmas spirit with you :)

*Hugs to you all*

Wroclaw, Poland

Hey, have you noticed that new blogger option which lets you choose a location? the one in compose mode, just on the left side from the labels....it works with google maps and you can choose whichever place you want....since its new, im not sure how is it gonna work with my cards, but im certainly eager to give it a try....though i will stick to the standard labels as well...

This card comes from Ksenia, who is in charge for my Wroclaw postcard collection :)
I really like the size of the card....long and thin.....feels interesting for the eye to view the cathedral through this kind of a card-size
This is the Ukranian Cathedral in Wroclaw, which was built as a Roman-Catholic church in the 13th century, but now is the cathedral of the Ukranian-Greek Catholic Church.
hmmm, i find that combination somewhat odd....Ukranian-Greek, yet resides in Wroclaw...but there, you'll get to learn all kinds of things through the postcards :)

Thank you VERY much Ksenia for the absolutely great card...I just love it!

Frederic Chopin, Poland

This card here shows the monument of Frédéric Chopin, in Lazienki Park in Warsaw. I really appreciate this card coz of what it portrays....i may be a total anti-talent for music and i may not really be familiar with all the composer's and their works but i definitely admire them and the classical music as well...i dont listen to it on daily basis...but i sometimes just love to put some classical music on while im working coz it just relaxes me and doenst distract me...sometimes i just want to play it while i lie down and have my eyes closed and try to relax...classical music is a high and unique form of art....often underrated....thats why i so much like this postcard....

Frédéric Chopin (1 March 1810 - 17 October 1849) was a Polish composer and pianist from the Romantic period. He is widely regarded as the greatest Polish composer, and ranks as one of music's greatest tone poets. In November 1830, at the age of 20, he went to Paris; following the suppression of the Polish November Uprising he became one of many expatriates of the Polish Great Emigration.
His extant compositions were written primarily for the piano as a solo instrument. Though they are technically demanding his style emphasizes nuance and expressive depth. Chopin invented musical forms such as the ballad and was responsible for major innovations in forms such as the: piano sonata, waltz, nocturne, etude, prelude and impromptu.

He had a frail health and died at the age of 39, of chronic pulmonary tuberculosis.

The bronze statue that you see on the card was erected in 1926, and it was designed in 1907 by Waclaw Szymanowski The statue was originally to have been erected in 1910, on the centennial of Chopin's birth, but its execution was delayed by controversy about the design, then by the outbreak of World War I.
During World War II the statue was destroyed by the Germans, on May 31, 1940. It was reconstructed after the war, in 1958. Since 1959, free piano recitals of Chopin's compositions have been performed at the statue's base on summer Sunday afternoons. The stylized willow over Chopin's seated figure echoes a pianist's hand and fingers.

And here is some of Chopin's work....recommended to be listened in a relaxed atmosphere with no distractions :)

Nocturne





Prelude in C minor




Funeral March



Prelude in E-minor

Vysoké Tatry, Slovakia/Poland

Here is another one of the forwarded cards (along with the one from Romania above)

I absolutely love the blue tone that dominates this one...
it was sent by a former Belgian pen friend, Tine Bouckhyt from a visit to Slovakia
Vysoké Tatry, or High Tatras, are a mountain range on the borders between Slovakia and Poland (so again, double label...). They are part of the Eastern Tatras Mountains.
The major part and all the highest peaks of the mountains are situated in Slovakia. The highest peak is 2655m. Many rare and endemic animals and plant species are native to the High Tatras. Large predators, such as the bear, Eurasian lynx, marten, wolf and fox, live there.
The first European cross-border national park was founded here Tatranský národný park in Slovakia in 1948 and Tatrzański Park Narodowy in Poland in 1954.