Portugal

Portuguese card :)

Óbidos is a town of approximately 3100 inhabitants and municipal seat of the municipality of Óbidos, located in the Oeste Subregion, of the Estremadura historical province, in Portugal.

The area of the town of Óbidos is located on a hilltop, encircled by a fortified wall, but divided between the two parishes of São Pedro and Santa Maria in the municipality of Óbidos.

Óbidos remains a well-preserved example of medieval architecture; its streets, squares, walls and its castle are a popular tourist destination.

Hoorn

This card was sent to me from Hoorn - the province in the  North Holland.

"Hoorn" is a very old Dutch word for "corner", the cost makes a bend there.

It is located on the IJsselmeer, 35 kilometres north of Amsterdam, and acquired city rights in 1357. Hoorn has 70 196 inhabitants. The area of the municipality is 52,49 km² (32,62 km² consists of water, mainly the Markermeer), and consists of the following villages and/or districts: Blokker, Hoorn, Zwaag, and parts of Bangert and De Hulk.

Cape Horn, the most southerly point of the Americas, was named after the town by Willem Schouten, who rounded it in 1616. The Hoorn Islands are also named after this city.

The City Of Hoorn has a twin city status with:

• Beersel, Belgium, since 1979
• Malacca Town, Malaysia, since 1989
• Příbram, Czech Republic, since 1992

Spain...one more time :)

One of my official card from Postcrossing project :)

A postcard shows Tarragona – a little city with one hundred inhabitants, beaches with golden sand and crystal waters. The city has a historical past with more than two thousand years old, has many Roman ruins. From 2000 is on World Heritage for UNESCO site J

Sweden

This is the next postcard which I have got from my dear penfriend. Thank you J.

Lund, situated in the centre of the attractive and expansive Öresund region in southern Sweden, is one of the oldest cities in Sweden with a history more than one thousand years old. Over the centuries it has earned a reputation for being a place where people meet, and, today, more than ever, Lund is a meeting place for ideas and creativity.

Here, the university, science-park, multicultural atmosphere and historical surroundings make up a unique combination. This, along with its central situation, has turned Lund into an international city where ideas are born - ideas that build enterprises and achieve success both nationally and internationally (from here).

Twin towns — sister cities (from Wikipedia):

• Viborg Municipality – Denmark
• Hamar – Norway
• Porvoo – Finland
• Dalvík – Iceland
• Nevers – France
• León – Nicaragua
• Greifswald – Germany
• Zabrze - Poland

Sanford Mills

This is postcard which I have received from official exchange on Postcrossing:)

On that postcard you can see an old factory mill in Medway, in Massachusetts state. It looks like hundreds of other mills built in the 1800s in this part of US.
Sanford Mills first opened as a wool mill in 1885. Later it became a candle-making factory. In 1989 it was converted into condominiums. It's located off of Village Street along The Charles River. 

South California

This is my first postcard from this area – South California. Myrtle Beach is a coastal resort city in Horry County, South Carolina, United States.

Myrtle Beach is situated largely on a barrier island in Long Bay between the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway on the west and the Atlantic Ocean on the East. However, building west of the waterway is rapidly increasing and the city of Myrtle Beach is expanding further west.

Land east of the waterway is on a slightly elevated sandbar or dune area. West of the waterway the land is mostly pine forest with a normal high water table and is more dense than the sandbar to the east, in which developers dredge ponds and use the soil to create elevated areas for better drainage around buildings and structures.

The sender of this card wrote that her family are going there every summer for vacation. I probably know why – the place looks great J. 


p.s. I found this small destroyed on postcard when I took out from mailbox...:(  

My first postcard from Brazil

My next postcard was sent from São Paulo. It’s the largest city in Brazil.

It’s difficult to talk about São Paulo without mentioning its size. It is the fourth most populous city in the world, and the largest in the southern hemisphere. Almost 11 million people live within its 1,530 square kilometers, according to the year 2000 Census. 

Yet São Paulo is not an island in this sea of people. The São Paulo Metropolitan Area includes, besides the city itself, 38 other municipalities. As in any great metropolis, the population density is quite high and in many cases, it is difficult to know where the city ends. All told, the region is home to 20 million people, many from all over Brazil and the world.

Third P&L exchange postcards :)

This postcard I received from Samantha. She lives in north west area in Italy, in Cigliano.

It is a comune (municipality) in the Province of Vercelli in the Italian region Piedmont, located about 35 km northeast of Turin and about 30 km west of Vercelli. She wrote that her town it's still quiet place, even with 4500 inhabitants. 

Pike Place Market

This postcard I received from Joyce. It's show Seattle's Pike Place Market in the past and in the recently. 

Its nine acres and more than a century of operation encompass thousands of fascinating stories — tales of immigration, internment, renovation and urban renewal — all that help explain why Pike Place Market is called "The Soul of Seattle."

Here is a snapshot of how the Market came to be. Between 1906 and 1907, the cost of onions increased tenfold. Outraged citizens, fed up with paying price-gouging middlemen too much for their produce, found a hero in Seattle City Councilman Thomas Revelle. Revelle proposed a public street market that would connect farmers directly with consumers. Customers would "Meet the Producer" directly, a philosophy that is still the foundation of all Pike Place Market businesses.

On August 17, 1907, Pike Place Market was born. On that first day, a total of eight farmers brought their wagons to the corner of First Avenue and Pike Street—and were quickly overwhelmed by an estimated 10,000 eager shoppers. By 11:00 am, they were sold out. Thousands of would-be customers went home empty-handed, but the chaos held promise. By the end of 1907, the first Market building opened, with every space filled.

A century later, Pike Place Market is internationally recognized as America's premier farmers' market and is home to more than 200 year-round commercial businesses; 190 craftspeople and approximately 100 farmers who rent table space by the day; 240 street performers and musicians; and more than 300 apartment units, most of which provide housing for low-income elderly people. "The Market," as the locals affectionately say, attracts 10 million visitors a year, making it one of Washington state's most frequently visited destinations (from here).

The House

Welcome to the White House :)

However...it is not the white house you thought about :) I have got this card from Grodno - Belerus. Grodno is a city in Belarus. It is located on the Neman River, close to the borders of Poland (about 20 kilometers away) and Lithuania (about 30 km away). This city is the capital of Grodno Region and Grodno district.

On the postcard you can see the house, where Eliza Orzeszkowa (1841-1910) used to live. She was a Polish novelist, born in Belarus, to the noble Pawłowski family. In her sixteenth year she married Piotr Orzeszko, a Polish nobleman, who was exiled to Siberia after the January 1863 Uprising. 

Orzeszkowa wrote a series of powerful novels and sketches dealing with the social conditions of her country. Eli Makower (1875) describes the relations between the Jews and the Polish nobility, and Meir Ezofowicz (1878) the conflict between Jewish orthodoxy and modern liberalism. "On the Niemen" (1888), perhaps her best work, deals with the Polish aristocracy, and Lost Souls (1886) and Cham (1888) with rural life in Belarus. Her study on patriotism and cosmopolitanism appeared in 1880.

A uniform edition of her works was published in Warsaw between 1884-1888. Much of her work is available in a German translation.

According to official records of the Nobel Prize committee, she was considered for a prize in 1905, to share it with Henryk Sienkiewicz, but only the latter ended up as laureate.

Only 283 km and need 11 days....not that bad ;)