They always say that philately is a symbol of global friendship. But as the tradition of writing letters is diminishing, and the popularity of stamps is decreasing, is there any chance philately can survive?

Well, Slovenian philatelist Paulo Magalhães has proved it can. In fact, he and his small team of friends have managed to unite thousands of global citizens in bonds of friendship through one philately item: A postcard.

Since almost five years ago, his online project www.postcrossing.com has allowed people to receive postcards from all over the world. The idea is: If you send a postcard, you will receive at least one back from a random Postcrossing member from somewhere else in the world.

Yup, you don’t know to where and to whom your postcard will be sent, and you have no idea who will send you one back. It’s all about surprises.

“The randomness or surprise factor adds a nice touch to it because you get postcards from the most unthinkable places, which you would never get if you had to handpick them,” Magalhães told The Jakarta Post by email. “The randomness of the origin and of the sender, as well as not knowing when they will arrive, makes it much more fun and more interesting.”

Magalhães himself said he started his project because he loved to receive snail mail — not just from friends, but also from remote places. He admitted that the tradition of writing and receiving snail mail had become rare in today’s life, but added, “Because it’s becoming less common, it’s becoming even more special.”

“A postcard was chosen, paid for, written, stamped, posted in the mail and crossed several hands till it reached you,” Magalhães remarked. “It’s the true ‘I wish you were here’ symbol than an email can’t ever have.

“Plus, nobody hangs their emails on the fridge door, right?” he said.

As to whether Magalhães is right, Irayani Queencyputri can provide the answer. The member of Postcrossing said the project had allowed her to make friends with people from all around the world, while at the same time allowing her to collect beautiful postcards.

“The last time I wrote a snail mail to my pen pals was around 1997 or 1998,” recalled the 30-year-old dentist who lives in Jakarta. “But after I started university, I became so busy and forgot about my pen pals.”

Luckily, Irayani said, she found Postcrossing, where she was able to connect to global friends through the medium of postcards, which she describes as “pretty, collectible and less expensive.”

“Writing a postcard doesn’t require so much time,” she said. “Besides, I feel it more secure to send postcards rather than mail because, you know, it often happens that my mail never arrives at the receivers’ addresses,” she laughed.

Up until today, Irayani has received around 30 postcards from places like France, Belgium, Italy, the Netherlands, China, Singapore, Philippines and the United States of America.

“I find each postcard very unique because it shows a place that I haven’t seen before,” Irayani said. “For me, it’s like receiving a souvenir from other countries.”

Irayani is one of some 167,000 Postcrossing members from more than 200 countries. The project now receives an average of 303 postcards every hour, amounting to almost 4 million to date. According to

Magalhães, the project does more than just create friendships, it also sends love and lights up thousands of smiles across the world.  

Last year, for example, Postcrossing encouraged its members to send postcards of butterflies to lupus patients for World Lupus Day (butterflies are the lupus symbol). The idea of this program, Magalhães said, was to spread awareness about the disease worldwide. Not only that, Postcrossing members also sent their greetings to Tanzanian children in remote areas. The idea was to use postcards to lift their spirits and give encouragement.

Tanzanian children and lupus patients aside, is there any other case that truly proves the power of philately?

“The one I always mention is the couple that met through Postcrossing and ended up marrying,” he said of an Australian man who married a Finnish woman in 2008.

So philately is, indeed, still full of surprises.

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