Even though it’s Monday, I’m still in weekend mode since today is a holiday… It’s Victoria Day in Canada but in Québec it’s also National Patriots’ Day. I guess in Finland it’s not a holiday today, but let’s meet the Penpal of the Week anyway!
Please tell us about you!
My name is Maiju and I’m 34 years old lady from Finland. I guess I am bit cosmopolitan, I used to live abroad (@Scotland) nearly 4 years, working. Atm I am planning to move abroad again, but it’s not sure yet. I’m single and have no pets nor children. If I would not be so allergic, I’d have a bunny or Basset hound. I just tend to buy soft toys to fullfill this love xD
Me at work 2012. Picture was taken just before small show.
I have no idea how to describe me shortly. I know I am bit un-womanly creature, as I am as tall as any man and I like manly things, like historical weapons (prehistory-1830), sci-fi and fantasy, WWE etc. odd things. I am also general history freak. I’ve been re-enacting 15 years and role-gaming/playing 14 and these hobbies still fill my calendar and life.
ATM I have too much time to spend on things I like and most days are filled with embroidering (I am really good), playing pc-games, sewing historical costumes by hand and historical dances. Erm… What else to tell… I hang around gothic and LGBT-events a lot (when I have enough money). I’m also bit of otaku, not much but…
Picture taken just before one tv-filming.
I esp. love my victorian hat and I use it as often as I can.
Describe your personality in 10 words!
Creative, funny, understanding, lazy(ish), nice, goth(ish), artistic, bi(ish), helpful, sleepy and grotesque.
Viking age woodcarving from Sweden.
I did draw this picture for a calendar.
How long have you been penpalling? How did you first start? Tell us about your first penpal!
I started penpalling when I was 9 and continued it till I was 20. I picked up this lovely hobby again when I was 27 and starting night-shifts at work. It was really nice to write letters middle of the night at work. I can not actually remember my first penpal. It might have even been my much older cousin. I recall that we (my class) ordered penpals from/via this one old penpal service, which name I can not remember. I got one boy from Africa as my penpal. Although that “friendship” did not last long, as he was always asking presents. I had few Finnish penpals, but as I was bit boring at young age, all of them stopped writing in some point. 2 of my penpals I’ve been writing with since early 90′s. I’d prefer long lasting friendships luckily I have found few.
Handpainted card I made for my mum.
How many penpals do you have now and where are they from?
Atm I have only few active penpals (unfortunately) and most of them are quite new. I have 2 from India, 2 from Poland, 2 from US and one from Australia. My Finn pals are more like Facebook-pals now, as they all don’t seem to have time for real letters.
What are your favorite topics to discuss in letters?
I can talk nearly about everything, but my favourite subjects definitely are history, costuming, books, sci-fi and fantasy and Archaeology. And all kind of craft-projects. I also tend to talk about re-enacting, LGBT/gothic parties I go (very seldom) and cultural differences/traditions.
I also do gilding and this is a practice work I used as letterpaper.
The image is late 1500′s embroidery design.
What are you looking for in a penpal?
I think one of the key aspects to have is open-minded and understanding penpal. I might not like same things as my penpals, but I try to be understanding and supportive and I wish them to be the same. I think open mind might be the most important, as I have lost too many pals just because I have told them I am pagan and I hang around with “rainbow people”. Same interests are always a plus, but not a must. I love to hear about other’s daily life and I don’t mind getting “diary-like” letters.
One of the horror-decos I’ve made.
What do you like the most about penpalling?
Writing and papers. I am paper-holic. I tend to collect all kind of things I can use for letters or decos. I also like to use dip pens a lot. I do calligraphy and some days I practise that artform by writing a letter. I also love to build a friendship via letters. These days people use computers a bit too much for communication and I prefer to “keep in touch” via real paper and ink.
In what language(s) do you correspond?
Finnish and English. I might be able to write whole, but simple letter in German and Swedish and I know few things by Greek, Latin, Japanese and Scottish Gaelic.
What are some of your habits in regards to letter writing?
I normally play music while writing, normally that would be my “adrenalin”-playlist @ spotify. I also write all my letter while sitting on my pc-chair and supporting a large book on my knee. I use that book as “table” for writing. I have bad habit to write letter few days, writing few lines every night. Some rare occasions I have enough time to
write decent length in one “sit”, but that happens too seldom. I normally start writing just before going to bed and continue till I nearly fall asleep. I wish I had more time to write.
Has anything strange/funny ever happened to you since you’ve been penpalling?
Hmm… I have not really got any unusual requests since I was a kid. Then African penpals asked all kind of things. One letter I got was huuuuge paper shaped and colored to present a dragon. That was very lovely.
Part of my vast collection of fancy paper.
I love gothic and historical sets.
Have you met any of your penpals?
I might tell you a story how I met one of my Finnish penpals face to face. I was working as kitchenslave at historical dance camp and I had few other people helping me/us. One of the young girls started to talk about her hobbies (not mentioning penpalling) etc. On the second day I started to think “That girl has same hobbies as one of my pals. She also is about the same age…” “Hey girl, does your family name happen to be XXX?” “Erm… yeah… why?” “Remember Maiju XXX from Turku?” … It took while before she remembered me, as we had not been writing for a long time. I had no idea that she has actually started to dance etc and she did not remember that I had been talking about historical dances a lot.
I have met only few of my Finnish penpals, I was supposed to meet my Brittish, longterm penpal at WWE-wrestling match, but I did not get time off from work. That would have been so cool. If I ever have money to travel to US, I am definitely going to meet few of my pals at DraconCon or any similar geek-convention. I might have chance to see my Polish pals this summer, as I will be attending huge medieval battle there.
Sample of my favorite lettersets (all Dark Horse-brand) and some stickers I have.
This is about 5% of my whole pile of stickers and papers.
Are you currently looking for more penpals?
Yes I am! I am esp. looking for native American and pagan/Gothic/LGBT-penpals. Or anyone who is willing to write longterm with this odd creature. I am also looking for deco-swappers. If interested, drop a line to kydonia79@gmail.com
Thank you Maiju!
It’s Monday again… So here’s another penpal interview for you guys.
Please tell us about you!
Hello everyone and greetings from The Netherlands, land of windmills, cheese, cows, stroopwafels, drop and tulips. My name is Willemijn and I’m 25 years old. In my daily life I’m a primary school teacher and I teach 5th grade, which is 10-11 year olds. Kids are so much fun: they’re honest, they’re playful and they’re just so much fun to look at. Especially kids with special needs are what makes a teachers’ job interesting. My favorite subject to teach is history – I just love history! Bring me to an old city or village and I’ll be a very happy girl. Besides history, art-classes are one of my favorites. It’s heartbreaking to see the lack of inspiration of the kids – they just don’t seem to be able to create stuff their selves anymore. So it’s a challenge to me to get them creative anyhow. And if I see a possibility to get them writing letters, I will of course. They can’t start loving mail young enough don’t you think. I even created mail art with my class last year!!!
You’re never too old for a teddybear like Baloo.
In my free time I love to meet-up with friends and family, they mean the world to me. Really, I can’t imagine life without them! I also love to play board- and card games (Skip-Bo and Boonanza are my favorite at the moment), watch tv-series like NCIS or Flashpoint, reading blogs all over the Internet, photography or go to see a musical. I’ve seen quite a few so far; Les Miserables, Joseph and the amazing Technicolor dreamcoat, Westside Story, Mary Poppins, Hairspray, We will rock you and some more I can’t think of right now. No day goes by without listening to music. Truly – the person who did invent Spotify is a hero!!! Oh, and can you say you’re a Disneyfan at 25? I loved the movies ever since I was a kid and I still can really enjoy watching The Lion King or Tangled. Don’t worry, I do watch other movies as well.
Besides all of this, I also love to craft and create. I’ve been scrapbooking for over 5 years now and I still love creating neat albums, presents and other stuff. About a year ago I discovered the world of mail art and I completely fell in love! I’ve been creating and decorating envelopes ever since and when I have to send out a plain envelope it just feels wrong! After all it is our duty to keep snailmail alive and keep the postmen love their jobs. If I can help by creating neat envelopes I will, haha. I do try to keep a blog updated – which is kinda hard to me, but I do try – so if you’re curious to see what I’m making; Maybird’s Palace.
Like almost everyone else I love to travel as well, especially citytrips are my favorite. Though last year I’ve been on a short trip to South England and I think I’ve lost my heart over there. The kind people, the views, the old cities… I really loved it!! Other places I’ve visited so far; Sarnia Canada, Orlando Florida, Prague, London (I just LOVE London!), Edinburgh, Paris, Luxembourgh City, Belgium and England. I’d really love to see and explore Peru, Africa, India… well, just every corner of this planet.
Describe your personality in 10 words!
Just using 10 words to describe yourself – that’s quite a challenge you know. But I’ll give it a try.
Creative, patient, sweet (feels odd to say about yourself, but it’s the truth), down to earth, social, family, friends, snail mail-lover, scrapbooker, musicalfan.
At Beachy Head in England. It was quite windy that day so it took
like 8 photos to make a good picture without my hair all gone wild.
How long have you been penpalling? How did you first start? Tell us about your first penpal.
I’ve been penpalling for quite some time now. The first time I’ve started penpalling is about 12 years ago I guess. A friend and I used to write letters to each other and actually send them by mail, even though we only lived 10 minutes apart. We met at a sportclub and were teammates for a couple of years before we started writing letters. Somehow that friendship ended, so did my penpaladventure and I actually never thought of it again. I kept writing though – diaries, short stories, quick notes for myself, so I never completely quit writing. Until like 3 years ago. A friend of mine told me about Postcrossing and I actually signed up the very same day. I got involved in a whole new world of sending postcards to total strangers and receiving mail. Instead of folders and bills there suddenly was nice mail to read. What a delight! But after a few months I figured out it somehow wasn’t exactly what I was looking for. I missed the actual contact, being able to respond to cards I received. That’s when I discovered the forum of Postcrossing and that’s where I got re-introduced to the penpalworld.
How many penpals do you have now and where are they from?
At the moment I’ve got 5 penpals. Andreas from Finland and Olga from Russia have been my penpals for over 2 years now, Juan from Spain and Michelle from England. I’ve met them at the Postcrossing forum. Another penpal is Elisabeth from Norway whom I actually met on this very site. All of them are great penpals and it really makes me feel happy to see a letter of them in my mailbox.
What are your favorite topics to discuss in letters?
Everything! Every days life, work, family, strange or fun things that has happened, travel stories, just about everything actually. In my letters I love to ask questions. That way you will always have something to write about, which is fun. I also love to read and write about our countries and the differences in our cultures. That way it feels a bit like traveling after all.
A Dutch Penpal ad without a windmill just doesn’t feel right.
What are you looking for in a penpal?
I think penpalling is a way of building some sort of a friendship. Having something in common, something to talk about or just a good connection, I think those ingredients can make or break a penpalfriendship. Personally I love writing long letters (2 A4 pages, both sides), so having a penpal who loves the same is just great. Actually I don’t have a lot of requests, I’m not that hard to please I guess.
What do you like the most about penpalling?
Looking into your mailbox to find out you received a letter. To know who wrote you just by looking at the way your address has been written. Finding yourself a nice, cozy spot on your couch with some tea within reach and then… just read and enjoy the letter you’ve received. Actually I love the whole bit, haha. Just the idea someone took some precious time to sit down for a while and to write you a letter, a real letter on real paper written with a real pen, that’s what I love most. That’s what I love most, that’s what makes my day.
In what language do you correspond?
I can write in English and Dutch. Unfortunately I’m not talented on learning new languages.
A small sample of my handwriting.
What are some of your habits in regards to letter writing?
Most of the time I’m sitting at my kitchen-table with some tea and back-ground music when I’ll reply to letters. I also love to sit on my couch while writing, but somehow it doesn’t effect my handwriting in a good way… My favorite pen to write with is a gelpen from Big or the old-fashioned Parker ballpoint. I do have some stationary but am not a collector and to be honest, most of the time I use a notebook to write in. If I don’t have lined paper my letters will go from small to BIG to small and so on. Writing in a neat and constant way is a bit of a challenge for me. I know, I know, as a teacher you should be able to write decent, and I think I am able to write decently, but I’m not as neat as a writer as most teachers are. But you’ll be able to read it, that’s for sure, haha.
I also love to send little packages every now and then, filled with random Dutch things I’ve found in stores. Keyrings, stroopwafels (Dutch cookies), bookmarks, newspaper articles or other fun stuff. Recently for example (April 30th), our country got a new King and Queen. Along with my letter I did send along some newspapers about that day, just to give it a little extra. And when it’s December 5th, we’ve got a special day here in The Netherlands; Sinterklaas. It’s a kind Santa Claus with Christmas, but not yet. Anyway, traditional with Sinterklaas we treat each other with the first letter of our name made of chocolate or pepernoten (some sort of ginger cookies). Well, let’s say that’s a great way to share traditions with my penpals, something which I love to do.
Just some pieces of mail art I’ve created.
Has anything strange/funny ever happened to you since you’ve been penpalling?
I once had a Dutch penpal who wrote me like twice a week. There was no way of keeping up with her letters and, to be honest, I didn’t want to either. She was so angry when I told her I wouldn’t mind writing her, but twice a week was way too much for me. We wrote for like 3 months or so but clearly she thought we’d been best friends and now I abandoned her in her opinion. She did send me an e-mail to make her statement and the things she said… After that I never heard from her again, luckily.
Another, more fun, thing happened to me just a few weeks ago. It was early in the morning on a Saturday when someone knocked on my door. It was the mailman – soaking wet and cold due the heavy rainfall. “Thank God you’re home!” He said. “I thought let’s give it a try in order to save this envelope. We don’t get to deliver pretty things like this too often so I didn’t want it to get wet!” Elisabeth wrote me a letter and made a stunning piece of mail art. It definitely would get drown if not for this mailman. There’s much to say about our Dutch mail system at the moment, but this man is a hero, don’t you think?
Have you met any of you penpals?
No, unfortunately not. But it would be great to meet them one day.
A picture I took in a zoo just a while ago. Just love the colors of this bird!
Are you currently looking for more penpals?
There’s always room for more friends. If you’re interested, just let me know! You can e-mail me at willemijn271087@hotmail.com (27-10-1987 is my day of birth, you can put it in your agenda right away :P).
Thanks Willemijn!
