Sunday Stamps: D is for Darwin and Dragon

This time the Sunday Stamps' theme is the letter 'D'.
Yesterday I happened to have received a postcrossing postcard from Czech Republic, showing a stamp which matches to the theme:



Charles Darwin, I think he doesn't need any introduction, pictured on a stamp designed by graphic designer Pavel Dvorský.

Darwin was famous by his book 'On the origin of species'. However, despite of the resemblance with the little animal on the Czech stamp, I think no one exactly does know the origin of the following animals:



These stamps were issued in honour of the Year of the Dragon. To two of them some relief has been added, or, as we also say in Dutch, some diepte (depth):



See more stamps showing the letter 'D' on Sunday Stamps!

Sunday Stamps: New Year

This week, on 16 February, the Chinese New Year will start: the year of the Dog.

That means, we'll say goodbye to the Year of the Rooster..
Dutch PostNL issued a stamp sheet on which you can see this change. 'Vaarwel jaar van de Haan' means 'goodbye / farewell to the year of the rooster', and 'welkom jaar van de hond' means 'welcome year of the dog':



Via Instagram I got to know several mail loving people from all over the world. And some of them are starting a so-called 'chaincard' themed 'Year of the Dog'. We are just about to start, so I haven't received any of the stamps yet, but some of them showed the stamps they'll going to use already in the instagram groups, and I like to share the print-screens of these stamp pictures with you!

On alphabetic order:

From Australia / Christmas Island:



From China:





From Indonesia:



From Japan:



From Korea:





From Malaysia:





From Singapore:



From Taiwan:



From Thailand:



On my turn, I'll add the Dutch Year of the Dog stamp to their cards. Dutch PostNL officially will issue this stamp sheet on 16 February, but to my surprise my order arrived already last week :-)



See more stamps of this coming New Year at and via Sunday Stamps.

Sunday Stamps: 'Z' is for zee, zeeschelp and zwemmen

We made it! In 26 weeks the owner of Sunday Stamps posted stamps of all 26 letters from the alphabet, and she made us - Sunday Stamps and Mail Lovers - do the same! Congratulations to all, and many thanks to Violet, thank you for hosting Sunday Stamps so carefully!

So, the last letter of the alphabet is 'Z'. In English pronounced as 'zea', in Dutch we name this letter 'zet'.

The first stamp I want to share with you is about the zee, sea in English. Zee is pronounced as [zey] or [zay] like in 'hey' and 'hay' (is there any difference in pronounciation between hey and hay? - I don't hear it!..).
And the letter Z is not only for zee, but also Zeeland, literally 'sea-land', which is the name of the province in the zuidwesten - south west - of the Netherlands. The country New Zealand is named after this province.



Last week this province was in the news and some historical movies were shown on television, because of a sad anniversary: in the night of 31 January - 1 February 1953 the North Sea Flood took place, and this flood took the lives of many victims.
This was the start of a dike protection plan, the so-called Deltaplan, to construct the Deltawerken (Delta Works). The construction took many years, and finally, in 1986 the main parts of the Deltawerken were finished. This stamp has been issued in 1986 in honour of the Deltawerken. The text says 'Deltawerken voltooid' ('Delta works completed') but in fact it was the main parts which were finished, and in 1986 the Oosterscheldekering was inaugurated. Finally, after more than 40 years of construction, in 1997 the last part of the Deltawerken was completed (which does not mean the end of all construction works: nowadays one has to maintain it!).
So, on this 1986 stamp you can see a part of the zee, a part of Zeeland and the forementioned part of the Deltawerken.

The province Zeeland is famous for the mussel cultivation (including selling / eating). I couldn't find a stamp showing a mussel, but today that is no problem as 'mossel' doesn't start with a 'z'. But fortunately I found a look-a-like, which at least is a zeeschelp - a sea shell, on this pretty stamp bwhich Eva has sent to me from Morocco:



One activity we can do in the zee is zwemmen (to swim). You also can do it in a zwembad (swimming pool), and some people make a match of it - zwemsport (swimming sports).
Coincidentally this 'chaincard' arrived back to me recently, after having been traveling to Thailand, Taiwan and Russia, where kind stamp lovers added stamps showing zwemmers (swimmers) to my card (and I added the Dutch zwemsport stamps to theirs). This is the result:



See what other 'Z' themed stamps others have found at and via today's Sunday Stamps!

Sunday stamps: Flying

Today the Sunday Stamps' theme is 'Flying'.

Apart from flying flies, wasps and mosquitoes (which I never have seen on stamps so far), the flying 'objects' I see around my home on a regular base are birds and airplanes (and leaves and maple seeds in autumn).

Dutch PostNL has started to issue a serie of four beautiful bird photo stamp sheets this year.
The third and fourth stamp sheet I hope to get in future. At this moment I can show you some flying birds from the first two sheets:

From the 'lentevogels' ('spring birds') the stork ('ooievaar' in Dutch):



and the black redstart (in Dutch: 'zwarte roodstaart' which literally means 'black redtail'),



And from the previous 'winter birds' sheet this greylag goose:




This flying bird I happened to receive yesterday, but it is in transit. The stamp is on someone else's chaincard, so I have to forward it. But fortunately I could make a scan in time :-)




Luckily some months ago I received one of my own chaincards back, themed 'aviation'. Here it is, after traveling from the Netherlands via Singapore, Thailand, Russia, back home, now showing several airplanes, and a helicopter:



See more interesting stamps, and wonderful variations on the theme 'flying' today's Sunday stamps and follow the links.

Sunday stamps: Roosters, Chickens

Today's theme of Sunday Stamps is 'Roosters, or Chickens'.

I was very happy and lucky that Dutch PostNL issued a serie of ten chicken stamps two months ago:



On 28th of January 2017, the Chinese Year of the Monkey turned into the Year of the Rooster. To my surprise Dutch Post had issued a Year of the Monkey stamp sheet (in August 2016, while the Year already was half a year old).
And in November 2016 there was this announcement of the coming change of the year, by this stamp sheet:



The text under 2016 and 2017 says: "Farewell Year of the Monkey" and "Welcome Year of the Rooster".

And in the end of January 2017 the Year of the Rooster stamp sheet has been issued:



You read it well: I was not only happy, but also lucky for these issues by Dutch PostNL! What is the case? Via Instagram I learned to know stamp loving people from almost all-over the world, and various people are joining so-called 'chaincard' projects. This way you form a group of 4 to 6 (sometimes more) people, mostly around a chosen theme. Via the private, so-called 'direct message' option of Instagram you can exchange addresses. Each person starts to send a postcard, with stamps matching the chosen theme. Consequently you send the next received cards to always-the-same member of this tiny group. And after having traveled via all countries of the participants, in the end your own card returns, with stamps from all of the participating countries.

Thanks to the Year of the Rooster, and to mail companies in several countries who issued 'Year of the Rooster' stamps, many chaincards are exchanged on this theme.

I couldn't resist to participate in some of them. This way several rooster stamps have been landed in my place, which I have forwarded to the next participants. For instance, from and to Hong Kong:



From and to Japan:



From and to Korea (in real some of the dark lines are shining like gold):



From and to Singapore:



Not only Asian mail companies issued Year of the Rooster stamps. Also, for instance, Ukraine:



And here you see a Canadian and USA stamp, to which I added the Dutch one:



All of the above stamps are from other people's postcards so they just were in transit at my place (and fortunately my scanner did work :-) ). Hopefully they will arrive soon and safely to the owners.

Meanwhile the first of my own chaincards returned home! To which, besides the Dutch and Singaporean stamps, also Year of the Rooster stamps from Taiwan and Thailand have been added. And the last sender, Komimi from Taiwan, was so kind to decorate my card with a few more nice birds:



The front side of the postcard (which I chose beacuse there is a Rooster in this famous English song):



See more Rooster and/or Chicken stamps at and via today's Sunday Stamps.

Sunday Stamps: Birds

Sunday 2 October it is Sunday Stamps time again!
The theme is 'Birds', and I think our feathered friends always making a nice theme.

I'd like to show you the stamps on my recent 'chaincard', which has been traveling between the Netherlands, Canada, Thailand and Hong Kong (click to enlarge):



On top you can see my card before the sparrow flew out. And below you can see the influence of a journey over three continents. Apart from some postmark ink, the sparrow arrived rather well!



One of the other chaincard fellows will receive these stamps (I love the puffin and crow stamp!),



See more Birds stamps on and via Sunday Stamps.

Sunday Stamps: Orange

This Sunday's theme of Sunday Stamps is 'Orange, yellow'.

The stamp which immediately came into mind, because it shows much yellow and even more orange, is this painting by famous painter Mark Rothko:




Pretty orange backgrounds are shown in the following two stamps, both happen to connect two countries:

The Monaco and Morrocan flag on this joint issue stamp from Morocco, and a lot of orange under the book:



From Thailand, orange behind a mailbox from Myanmar:




Almost monochromatic are these two stamps, issued on a ten stamp sheet in honour of Dutch letter writers:



The man pictured is Leo Vroman (1915-2014), a Dutch-American writer, hematologist (the book I've read is an autobiography, also about blood), poet, illustrator.


Finally a stamp which I like to share, is this one from Spain, showing a dear object. Which raises the question: is it orange or is it yellow?!



See more stamps on this theme on and via this Sunday's Sunday Stamps!

Sunday Stamps: the colour Red

This Sunday Stamps theme is 'the colour red'.
I thought I only had a few, but viewing the stamp through 'red glasses' learned me that there is a lot! Among them this selection.


Post-related red is the mailbox, in many countries:

from Malaysia:



from Myanmar, on a Thai stamp:



from the United Kingdom:



An old one from the Netherlands (nowadays they are orange and have two grey legs):



More post-related red you can see on these Dutch stamps, issued for the introduction of the postal code in 1978:






Red in crafts:

A rooster in cross stitch, from Belarus:



From China:




Ladies in/and red:

The famous French one:



Red blood, Dutch stamp issued to promote blood donation:




Red animals:

Beetle from Korea:



Fish from Japan:



Horses, one in red from Germany:



and two red horses, from Argentina:



And from Taiwan:



See more red in stamps at Sunday Stamps and via the links mentioned there.