Some wonderful letters were waiting for me when I got home yesterday. :) This one is from my dear penpal in Canada.
And the stamp.
I'm surprised how expensive the postage over there has become. When I was living in Canada a decade ago, I remember that it was something like CAN$1.25 to send a letter to Japan, but now it's CAN$1.80! Japan post office hasn't increased the postage for a long time (I think the last increase was in 1994), so I guess we're lucky. I hope many people keep using post office so that they can keep the postage as it is now! :)
And this lovely letter is from my dear penpal in Indonesia. She enclosed some nice designed Band-Aids for me.
It seems like the letter made a stopover at Taipei in Taiwan before it came to Japan! :)
I love the stamps!
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Has your country's post office increased the postate recently? Do you know how much it costs to send a letter to Japan? Increase on postage is not fun at all, but with all the email and SNS tools that you can exchange messages for free, I guess not so many people are willing to spend money on postages nowadays. :( However, I believe that the letter-writing is a wonderful culture that will survive this era of technology! :)
昨日帰宅するとお手紙が２通届いていました☆一通目はカナダより。切手はまた値上がりした様子で、1.8ドルになっていてビックリ。私がカナダに住んでいた10年ほど前は、日本へ1.25ドルで送ることができていたと記憶しているのですが、この10年で随分値上がりしたんですね～。他の国でもヨーロッパを中心にどんどん郵便料金が値上がりしていて、ペンパル達もあまり親しくないペンパルとの文通を終了している、とチラホラ聞いています。日本への送料は高いようなので、文通が終わってしまうなんてことにならなければいいなぁ。日本でも、沢山の人が郵便を利用して、郵便料金を今の料金で維持できるといいですね。
二通目はインドネシアのペンパルから。台湾の台北に誤って送られたのち、無事日本に届いたようです。良かった（＾＾）切手も素敵。
From Mexico, a letter (or postcard) to Japan costs $15 pesos = 1.16 USD ^^ I think it's cheap =3
ReplyDeleteWhen I saw "$15", I was like "WHAT??", but OK it's $1.16USD. lol From Japan to Mexico, to send a letter less than 25g, it costs 110yen=1.4USD which is OK. :)
DeleteHahahaha! XD funny! ~ yeah, it's OK ^^ I think mexican post service is cheap owo... sometimes o_o
DeleteDuring the time I've been writing with people outside of Finland the postage has been varying between 0,75€ and 0,80€. When I started it was 0,8€ but the price decreased for a year or two for some reason. We also got a 2nd class stamps (the mail takes a bit longer to arrive but it's 0,05-0,1€ cheaper.) during that time and in the end the prices were raised back to 0,8€ for a 1st class stamp to ANYWHERE.
ReplyDeleteI love the fact that no matter where you sent the letter the cost stays the same but if you send a package (let's say 250g) to Europe it's 2,7€ and to anywhere else it's 6,6€ :)
That's so cool that the price decreased! :) So it's always 0.8euros to send a letter to anywhere in the world? If that's so, that sounds simple and nice! Oh and I LOVE Finnish stamps, by the way. :D
DeleteSending mail abroad became cheaper in Germany in 2010. It used to be 1,00 Euro for a postcard to Japan and 1,70 Euro for a letter to Japan. Now it's 0.75 for both letters and postcards to Japan! :D
ReplyDeleteSo in Germany, too! It's so nice that the postage got decreased and also that's so nice that the stamp for both postcards and letters is the same! Here, it's different. 70yen=1.7euros to send a postcard to anywhere in the world, but the postage to send a letter differs depending on where you send it. :( To Germany, it's 110yen=1.1euros.
DeleteAdding to the reply from Steffelchen, they will increase thre price for a letter sent from Germany to Germany by three cents in January, form 0,55 € to 0,58 €. But I'm perfectly fine with that, they do a great job and also had a price decrease after we got the Euro. And before 2010 it was 65 cents for Europe, so it became a bit more expensive for letters in Europe, but a lot cheaper for letters worldwide :)
ReplyDeleteOh, and about the advend calendar swap: you gather 24 little presents and wrap them up, then you can either give them numbers if they should be opened in a certain order or you don't give them numbers if the order doesn't matter. You send them all together to one person you are assigned to send it to and receive a calendar from another person. You can send stationery supplies, candy or other treats, candles, stickers - whatever you can think of. I hope I expressed myself well now :)
Oh, and once you receive your calendar you have 24 little gifts as well - so it's one present for each day of December until christmas has finally arrived :)
DeleteGerman post office seems to be doing a great job with keeping the postage reasonable. Is that a private company or own by the government?
DeleteOK, now I get what I have to do for your swap, and I'm in! Thanks for explaining that to me! I will fill out the form on your blog later! Can't wait! :D
Postage prices in France last increased in 2011 if I remember well. A letter within France now costs 0.60€ instead of 0.58€. Actually prices regularly increase (something like once every two years), but the increase is really little each time.
ReplyDeleteNow it costs 0.89€ to send a letter from France to Japan (up to 20g)
0.89euro to Japan is not that bad as it's 1.1euro for us to send a letter (up to 25g) to France, but I usually write fat letter that probably exceeds 20g, so I guess I have to put extra stamps. I even can't keep my letter less that 25g so usually end up putting extra stamps anyways.
DeleteSending a letter anywhere out of India starts at less then 0.50 US cents, so it is not at all expensive. However, the postage cost used to be even less 2-3 years ago if I remember right, less than 0.30 US cents xD
ReplyDeleteBtw, I love the Indonesian stamps too!
0.50USD sounds nice! From here to India, it's 1.2USD, so that's not that bad either. And me too! I love that pattern on the Indonesian stamps! They're really lovely! :D
DeleteSending the letter from Poland to Japan costs 3,50zł (it's about 0,85€).
ReplyDeleteThe Indonesian stamps are beautiful:)
How do you pronouce your currency of "zl"? I'm curious. :D And yes I love those Indonesian stamps. They're gorgeous! :D
DeleteIt's "zloty" (with a funnly "l" in it - my computer!). Sorry for interfering! :0)
DeleteThanks! And "zloty" sounds so difficult to say...lol
DeleteFrom Italy to Japan a 20grammes letter (or even a single postcard) costs 1,60€.
ReplyDeletea 50gr letter is 3€ and a 100gr is 4€.
A letter/package of 250grammes is 7€!
Wow, sending a postcard from there to Japan is that expensive? And a letter up to 50g is 3 euros? That IS expensive! From here to Italy, up to 25g, it's about 1.1euros and up to 50g it's 1.9 euros, so your postage sounds really expensive!
DeleteSending letter to Japan from England is £1.28 (up to 20 g, which means 3 sheets of paper and that's about it!) which is not cheap I think! Then it is £1.90! I think there were at least two price increases in last five years! The Royal Mail is not too snail-mail friendly I am afraid! ^_^
ReplyDeleteI thought £1.28 isn't that bad, but oh only for 20g? Then not so nice. :p My letters often get fat and end up putting extra stamps, so I don't think I would never be able to manage to write a letter less than 20g!
Deletewell, in Portugal post office increased the postate too... but last time increaseament was may b about 2 years ago...
ReplyDeleteUP to 20 grs: To japan i pay 0.80€ for a snail. Inside portugal i pay 0.32€, to europe i pay 0.68€, to spain i pay 0.57€, and all countries outside europe i pay 0.8€ up to 20 grs also.
Not too bad.
I will always keep sending snail mails..there it's nothing as magical as sending/getting them....e-mail or sms (text messages) r 2 virtual!!! :(
(At times ur blog do not accept my messages, it's hard 2 write with that codes we had 2 put on boxes...they are always so unclear,and half the times the blogger do not accept our tries... :( )
Keeping my letter less than 20g would be a little difficult as I write much longer, but it's still sounds pretty reasonable. :)
DeleteI know. Sometimes it's annoying to type these codes to leave a message. I thought of changing it to confirming every message instead of asking you to type the code. I'll see.
thanks.
Deleteyeah i have trouble too bcose i always have so many things 2 write about, and thinga 2 add in and put inside the enveloppe.... ****
I always thought the Netherlands were most expensive, but from all of you I learn that this is not the case, and prices vary a lot, even within Europe. Thank you all for sharing!
ReplyDeleteSince two years the Dutch post issues '1' stamps, on which you cannot see anymore how much it costed (it's similar to some other European countries and to the USA 'forever stamps').
Sending a postcard or letter (less than 20g) from the Netherlands to Japan (and to all countries outside Europe) is a 'wereld 1' (world 1) stamp, which now costs € 0.95. If it weights from 20 to 50 grams the price is € 1.90 (so one has to stick two 'world 1' stamps).
From the Netherlands to European countries: € 0.85. And from the Netherlands within the Netherlands: € 0.50. Some years ago this was € 0,39, though since then prices increased almost every year: next year will be € 0.54 within NL, and € 0.90 to European countries. However sending to all countries outside Europe ('World 1 stamps) seems to stay € 0.95 next year.
For me - like you a snail mail lover (and I love mail art) - the postal system seems amazing. Our mail travels so many kilometers, hundreds to thousands of kilometers - just by sticking a small nice paper on the card or envelope (called postage stamp :-) )
I always think that this "forever stamp" kind of stamp is a good idea since you don't have to do the math depending on where the letter is traveling to (I enjoy choosing the stamps but not the math part. :p).
DeleteAlso, it's nice that the postage differs only among inside The Netherlands, European countries and the rest of the world because in Japan it differs among(1)inside Japan, (2)Asian countries, (2)North American countries/Central America/Oceania/Middle East/Europe and (3)South America/Africa. Sometimes I had to check if this country is Asia or Middle East or Central America or South America...lol I wish it were more simple like your system!
I totally agree with you! Postage stamp is a magical item for all the penpallers! :D
I always thought that the 'forever stamps' were invented by the Dutch post to increase their rates without us realizing :-) And to hide the differences between the rates within European countries.
DeleteLater I learned that 'forever stamps' are a world wide phenomenon, and I agree with you: it makes it a lot easier :-) (although I had to look up on my world map and on the post website some countries in East-Europe and West-Asia of which I didn't know whether they would be 'World' or 'Europe'!.. But looking up countries in the map is fun, too! :-)
However, I love math!, and many times I try to 'compose' the stamps. For instance, in December the post always issues 'December stamps' which last year cost € 0.36. Because there aren't many different '1 Europe' stamps, I always try - for my post within Europe - to combine one '1 December' stamp and one '1 Nederland' stamp or the older € 0.44 stamp and extra € 0.02 stamps.
An other maths challenge are the older stamps, from the pre-euro era, over 10 years ago. Then the Dutch currency was the 'guilder' (= Fl = florijn, 'gulden' in Dutch, 1 gulden = € 0.45). And there's some company who sells the old 'gulden' stamps, but as the rates have increased a lot, we have to combine them as well. So for '1 World' stamp we have to count € 0.95 which means to combine 3 or 4 guilder stamps until the amount Fl 2.10 has been reached. (Three examples you can see on my blog, below in the post of 14 October - thank you very much for following!).