From
the Midwest to
Budapest
A postcard waits to capture your travels on the hotel desk.
You might write about:
1. Your day
2. The people you see/meet/like/dislike and why
3. The places you see, what’s different between them and the
people in your own town.
4. Where you are going next
5. What the food is like. Is it the same or different?
Did you like it? What was it called in the native language,
and in English? Where did you buy it?
Are the café’s the same or different?
6. Your favorite quote. Share it. This is short, sweet
and to the point to let them know you’re thinking of them.
7. The store you bought the postcard at
8. Where you are staying. Do you like your hotel/hostel/camp ground, or are you sleeping on a park bench?
9. List all the new things you did that day. You’re on an adventure so make your friends and family jealous.
10. What made you happy today?
Postcards still popular 150 years later
Postcards have been around for more than 150 years. The first known picture postcard was mailed in London by the writer Theodore Hooke to himself in 1840. The card had a hand-painted design and a black penny stamp. The black penny stamp was the world’s first adhesive postage stamp.
The black penny stamp was issued for official use on May 1, 1840, and put in to circulation on May 6, 1840.
The stamp was to be used for one year and had the profile of Queen Victoria.
While the stamp only cost a penny in 1840, today it has an estimated value of £3,000–4,000 (if it is in mint condition). Four thousand pounds is worth roughly $6,694.40.
Since its first appearance, the postcard has fallen in and out of style.
In the United States, companies sending advertisements first made postcards popular in December of 1848.
In 1873, Postmaster John Creswell introduced the first pre-stamped “Postal Cards,” often called “penny postcards." Postcards were made popular shortly thereafter by the general public because people were looking for an easy way to send quick, inexpensive notes.
Today postcards can be bought and mailed from all over the world for just a few dollars. Postcards receive the same care as sealed letters, and it’s a federal offense for anyone other than the intended recipient to read them. Not even U.S. postal workers are supposed to read them.
Postcards today, however, serve less as intercity notes and more for
travelers to let the people back home know they're still being thought of.
Story by Victoria Fairfield
A new twist on sending postcards to family and friends while traveling
is to have a stranger write the message.
You buy the postcards and stamps, and then address them to your friend or family member. After that prep work, you hand out postcards to strangers asking them to make up a story for your friend or family member about how he or she met him or her. Your friend or family member will start receiving postcards from all over the world with stories about how they supposedly met said stranger overseas.
The inventor of this game is a friend of mine, Rebecca Loudermilk, who plays this game with her mother every time she travels. Her mother, in turn, has a box full of postcards from people she's never met, explaining how they meet for the first time, how they're long-lost lifetime friends, or how they fought off an alien invasion together.
The Ball State Budapest group signed a Budapest postcard and mailed it from Budapest to the staff of the Rinker Center for International Programs.