Wish you were here
When did you last send a postcard? Is it something you have never done, always do, or perhaps like the idea of doing but can’t really be bothered? Our family loves a postcard. I grew up with them; my parents were away one time (somehow my brother and I weren’t with them) and they sent a card addressed to ‘Monkey and Sausage’. We were invited in the card to guess which was who. You can imagine the argument, and I think my father felt a twinge of regret on his return.
But I inherited the habit and can’t step beyond Brighton without heading for the nearest shop to buy a postcard or two to send to my nearest and dearest, and they reciprocate. Unfortunately, I have begun to encounter a problem. Things ain’t what they used to be in the world of postcards. It seems they may be a dying art, or at least the practice of sending them is on the wane. Whatever the reason, postcards are becoming harder to find; fewer shops sell them and those that do have a much more limited range than used to be.
This succinct form of communication celebrated its 150th birthday in 2020. The first cards were issued by Austria-Hungary in 1869. They were produced in two languages – German and Hungarian – and were extremely popular. A year later the idea was brought to Britain and it met with equal success. In 1871 around 75 million postcards were sent in Britain and volumes increased vastly to over 800 million a year by the end of King Edward VII’s reign in 1910. They were cheap, quick to write, and with several collections and deliveries each day, a speedy and efficient way to keep in touch.
Would that it worked so well nowadays…last year we were touring a part of northern Italy and while in Vicenza I realised that I had not yet bought a postcard, let alone a stamp. Finding some suitable postcards was relatively easy, but buying stamps was a different matter altogether. The shop assistant offered me orange stamps from a private company. Caveat emptor. If I wanted my cards bought and sent in May to arrive by Christmas it would have been perfect, but members of the family have already been caught by this scam. I politely refused and was informed that I would have to go to the Ufficio Postale.
We trailed around town till we found the post office, to discover that there was a ticketed queueing system. People were getting their pensions, enquiring about their savings accounts, and every time I got closer the numbering seemed to change and I had not moved along at all. After some time I took a deep breath and dashed up to one of the counters as someone was moving away. In my best Italian (I had had plenty of time to perfect my sentence) I explained that I only wanted to buy a few stamps and while I knew that this was a minor request I would be extremely grateful if….Reader, she was kind to me and sold them to me on the spot.
I end with a happier experience. We went to Paris for the weekend and I found postcards by a metro station and bought stamps in two minutes at La Poste. We got to Gare du Nord to return home, and there was a yellow post box in the heart of the station. Job done.