Soaking Japanese etched stamps and telegraph stamps

I've not soak almost any stamps since I re-start philately as there're many off-paper stamps on sale on the stamp market, however sometims I have to do soak for example when I found some of Thurn&taxis mint block are sticked to the other block or when I found Japanese old stamps with ugly backside with hinge or old papers.
So whenever I try soaking, I'm very serious because I do it with not cheap stamp but with stamps valued around $10 and more.

The shown is Japanese telegraph stamp 15 sen issued in 1885. which was with dirty backside before the soaking. It was in bad condition, however I'd like to hold it to check the manufacturing point. Yes I got interested in Japanese etched stamps recently.

 

EUROPEX 2013 held in Tokyo on Jan.19-20 2013

We're going to have  First Europe Stamp Exhibition during 19th and 20th Jan. 2013.

This is a non-competitive stamp show of European Stamps which we host annualy and this is the first time. The theme of the exhibition of this year is the Black Sea and Stamps of 7 countries around the Black Sea are exhibited such as Russia, Georgia, Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova and Ukraine.

 

I've been opening the stamp market.

Today I opened a stand at a stamp fleamarket at Asakusa, Tokyo and sell Stampedia Philatelic Journal, both edition of 2011 and 2012.
I heard from my friends Mr.Yosuke Naito that literatures are not popular in this fleamarket, however I sold more than ten copies in three hours, so I'm happy with the result.I appreciate all the people coming to our stand and get our magazine.
There're some people who only buy last year edition as he bought this year edition this month. So I feel it is important to publish such kinds of philatelic magazine continuously. Of course we'll publish 2013 EDITION to make you satisfy.

Stampedia Philatelic Journal gets Vermail at SHARJAH 2012 FIAP show.

We'd like to report that "Stampedia Philatelic Journal" gets Vermail at the literature division of the SHARJAH2012, FIAP show, held in UAE.

Though we got the same medal at PHILANIPPON2011 last summer, we're very happy to have this medal as it is held far from Japan. 

We're going to exhibit it at those exhibition; All Japan Stamp Exhibition 2013, Australia2013, Bangkok2013, Brazil2013 and Japex13.

I think we could improve our level by getting some advice of the judges. 

Mini stamp show of JP occupied area in S.E. asia

We'll have a mini stamp show of JP occupied area in S.E. asia during 21st and 23rd Nov. 2012 at Stamp museum in Mejiro, Tokyo.
I exhibit 3 frames (48 leaves) this time and as it is not a competition based on FIP rule, I make the exhibit work as I like to show by myself.The title means "the stamps overprinted later in JP occupied area in S.E. asia" and I showed all the stamps but 10 missing in mint condition. I also showed the overprinted stamps but as there're too many varieties, I only showed some of them.
I'll be in the mini stamp show on 23rd, why not come to our show? I'll exhibit this work on stampedia exhibition soon, however I'd like to show some leaves here.

We've finished the domestic stamp show in Japan

Last weekend, we had a domestic stamp show called JAPEX and it was 6th times since I re-started philately. I spent boring time there in the first 4 years as I do only catalogue general collection but traditional philately and no exhibit, no philatelic friend in Japan, no interest on auction houses which deals no world stamps but Japan. I spent , however, very busy days last year and same this year.

It is because my philatelic level of knowledge and people goes up than before. I'm happy with it of course. But I also think this is why philately get fewer and fewer new comers every year.

During the period of the show, Mr. Sumihide Ito, a famous collector of Japanese definitives, Showa series were near his exhibit and give a paper and talk to the people seeing his collection. I'm very happy to hear his talk and knowledge as it is very smart and I got interested in this series. I don't think it easy to do the same thing for all the exhibitors, however. I also understand the exhibition is based on the FIP rule and what i most important is to appeal to the judge but the visitors. What I'd like to say is there're something which shoud be done without breaking the FIP rule to appeal to the ordinary visitors such as providing papers, movies and audio guidance. These technology has already been used at the general museums and otherwise they can not catch new visitors who feels happy becuase they can understand it. I like both of Japex and All Japan Stamp Show and appreciate the comittee, however I'd like to do something more to appeal to the ordinary visitors.

By the way, the shown is a parcel front of 1888-92 Japan definitive 1 Yen, the highest value of the series. I'm making general Japan definitive cover collection and this is one of the difficult stamps, however I got it at the starting price at Japan Stamp Auciton held during the show this time. I'm happy because I got it cheaper and not block the other specialist of this series.

Condition can be better-than-expected Japanese visual stamp catalog!

"Visual Japanese Stamp Catalogue Vol.1 Commemoratives 1894-2000" is newlly published by JPS.
I think it's a very nice literature, though it is not on sale at Amazon.com.
It cost only 1,470 yen = 15 Euro, howerer it is A5 size 310 pages Full color.
It's very cheap when you compare it with Gibbonz Great Briatin Concise Catalogue which cost around 30 pound.
 

Visiting the music Stamp Exhibition (Oct..27th, 2012)

It's around the end of October, however this is the first time to write a blog this month as I've been so busy preparing and editing "The Stampedia Philatelic Journal 2012".

Well now I've returned to my daily philately and I've been to the Music Stamps Show this weekend. It was not a competition and small exhibition. I didn't know Mr. Onuma, my friend in thematic philately is the chairman of this music stamp society until I visit this time. He exhibited 2 frames collection of traditional philately, German stationeries of Beethoven, which is also used for single stamps such as 8 pfenniges issued in 1927. According to Micheel, there're 73 kinds of this stationeries issued, so I feel Mr. Onuma will exhibit them at some competition in the future. 

I've got also interested in Mr.Nakadate's work ”Overture 1812" which tells a story of Napoleon's life and I spent more than half a hour to see this work.

 

 

Is it common among US modern stamps?

These two stamps shown come from one lot of covers. The red ink of the right stamp is out of allignment. Can you see it? 
I think such gap is rare among Japanese modern stamps, however I feel common among US stamps. How do you think ?

What I got at the Bazaar in Osaka (Japan Stamp Auction)

I've been to Osaka for one night to participate in the Jpana Stamp Auction. Because I usually use overseas auction houses, I bid mainly on telephone but little going to the auction room. But recently I change my mind to participate in the auction room as much as possible. The reason is I realised the auction room is, especially that of the Japan Stamp Auction, hub for the philatelists in this area, I mean west side of Japan. It is a wonderful chance for me to meet many philatelists of various specialities. It cost me around 600USD to visit Osaka from Tokyo including one night stay, however I like the chance to meet many philatelists as I'm new to philately.

I can meet many philatelists there this time and they advise me and I feel interesting talking with them. Thank you very much. By the way besides bidding in the auction, there are some dealers and philatelists selling stamps like Timbre de Marche in Paris. I got many international covers before the WW2, however what I'd like to show today is panda stamp. This stamp was issued in 1982 and the first Japanese stamp depicting Panda. As I like this stamp, whenever I find it, I bought all of them! Some day I'd like to exhibit thematic collection of Panda!

Fireworks

I don't think it's very hot in Tokyo this year and here we have many fireworks events. As you know, there're several Japanese stamps depicting fireworks and I love them. We also have new fireworks stamps this year and I'd like to show the used EXPRESS example here.

Furusato stamps Local festival 8th series "Tenjin Matsuri" ( one of two se-tenants) issued on June 15th, 2012.

Post; Aug. 3rd 2012 / Numazu-Nishi 

Arrival; Aug. 4th 2012 /  Akasaka

 

97 HONG KONG WILL COME BACK TO CHINA .... What's this?

What I'm now studying is these Chinese commemorative sheet. The set contains five sheets and each has the number such as Hong Kong J97.111 5-1 but they are not stamps. I found there're  some examples in Chinese net auctions but there are no more information there. The set of five is sold at 15 RMB equal to around 2 USD. What is important for me is what it is.... If you know what it is, please give me some comment!

Japan Postal Cards Collection

It is not so easy collecting postal stationeries when I was in Jr. high school as there are no net-auction and stamp flea market those days. Of course there were some stamp show and some dealer provided those stationeries at the higher costs than the price shown on the catalogues. I can seldom get them.
The shown below are what  I get at the flea market in Tokyo last Saturday. It cost me 4USD for all (50cent per each), though the catalogue price is 12USD. They're on sale without thinking varieties of cancellation, so it is possible to make a nice collection of post cards without paying too much.
I know there are some examples with special cancellation of the trial machine cancellation and so on, however I'd like to complete it with normal cancellation at first.

Summer greeting cards and other stationery time of elementary and junior high school students, was curious in a colorful picture book reading only the hole and Japan stamp colors. Where is it at the time I also intended to collect? I did not know. I did not even online auctions, but it was not mentioned in hand with value significantly greater than the catalog value, etc. Although you will see occasionally JAPEX.
Below is a Japanese stationery, recently found a sheet from a bunch of 50 yen stamp on the market. The catalog is $ 1,200 cherry evaluation does not depend only eight so 400 yen. Because the 50 yen mark the type of uniform in spite of New Year's date and, if you pick up a decent collection, use your head. It becomes high type or special handling Hitachi enters, in the range you can buy for $ 50 a piece, I wanted to try to complete a little.

Movie of Stampedia Exhibition

 

We prepared this movie for the last PHILANIPPON2012. I'd like to show it again here. Click the triangle!

If I were a Jr. high school student, I can make a nice collection with using Stamp Flea Market.

Yesterday I went to the stamp fleamarket in Ikebukuro. I bought many covers (cost 50cent -1 USD per each) but paid only 30-40 USD at most. When I buy stamps at stamp flea market, all I need is time but money. It is really interesting finding nice material from mountains of covers, however I can keep doing at most one hour now and this time I gave up doing it after 90 min. working!! It's more fun talking with friends in a cafe nearby.

When I was in Jr. high school students, there are no stamp flea market in Tokyo. If there were such a flea market those days, I believe I could make the better collection in my childhood. So I think the philatelic situation in Tokyo is especially fantastic for the younger philatelists now, however, there were no child philatelists in the fleamarket yesterday as usual...  

Making of Stampedia

 

We prepared this movie for the last PHILANIPPON2012. I'd like to show it again here. Click the triangle!

 

JAPAN, FDC of bilingual machine cancellation

As I've been to the west-Japan, it's been a time since I write a last blog. I'm happy I  wrote 21 blog spots last month! Well by the end of July, I've finished writing articles for some philatelic magazines and decided to apply some intenational exhibitions. I'm going to exhibit my Swiss collection for the upcoming exhibition and I think it'll be accepted as it is a first time I exhibit that work at an international show, so I have to study more and more from now on. I have fun with studying plate position, classification of papers and stampless covers.

By the way, the shown is what I get recently as my sub collection of bilingual machine cancellation.I'd like to make an exhibit work on this cancellation some day. TOKYO Dec. 1, 1968. The first day cancellation.

How to classify Strubel (1) 2 Rappen, 1 Franc

The classification of Strubel has changed since Mr. Urs Hermann's study was published in 2005 and I think this will be the new standard. I'm trying to classify my Strubels once again with this information.
2Rappen
As this stamp was issued 3months before the new series come, there are no variety in manufacturing point. When I see my stocks together, however, it seems there are some difference in shade. I think this is because of Glue burns, so I should confirm it. Unfortunately I have no used 2rappen.

You  can classify 1Franc  into three. One is with silk thread black, the othe with silk thread yellow and the last one with thin paper.The last one is very rare and the catalogue price is 10,000CHF, but I found one at some accumlated collection.(See the second line below.) It has little margin and cut in unfortunately, so the valuation is not so high as 10,000CHF, I'm happy to have one and I like getting acumlation as I can get such a rarity with cheap cost and knowledge.
By the way, all the stamps  I see have  black silk thread and no yellow one. There are two stamps at the third line below and they have no silk thread and cna't classify, but the shade of the first stamp in the first line and the first stamp in the last line is different and I think this is also because of the glue burns. How do you think about it?

How To Use Stampedia International Stamp Catalogue (Video)

We prepared this movie for the last PHILANIPPON2012. I'd like to show it again here. Click the triangle!

I'm working with stamp packet of TURKEY 500 different.

It's been a long time sice I last worked with stamp packet. How happy it is, though it cost only 3 cent per stamp. I think it's a fun of philately! How can I tell this fun to Jr. philatelists? I'd like to write an article this time with this mind.
Shown photoe is the result I classfied stamps with the philatelic classification of Stampedia Turkey Catalogue.

Stampless cover of Zurich Canton "Five month without stamp again"

On March 1, 1843, Canton of Zurich issued the first stamp of European continent, however they have five month period starting in 1949 without stamps just after the change of national postal rate of Swiss Confederation because there are no stamps which suits for the national postal rate.
I recently got one cover of the period and show it here. This cover was cancelled at Zurich in the afternoon Jan. 24, 1850 and you can see a stamp "Franco" which means the postage to the destination is fully paid.  This cover was going to Eschbach, Baden  (South of Germany now) and the amount those days was  6 Kreuzer .
There are not so many international letters those days, so the postal clerk can not always tell the full postage rate to foreign countries. But as Baden is close to Zurich, the postal clerk knows the rate and that's why the sender of this letter paid fully and the cover has a red "Franco" stamp on it.
By the way, according to the Michel Guide of Stampless Cover, the amount the sender paid is written in red on the back of the letter, so I saw the back to find "6" in red.
I got this cover at 100CHF and this is one tenth-thirtyth of cover with stamps, though this cover is rare as it goes to foreign country with rare red Franco stamp on it. However I can enjoy with this cover very much as it has many points. As a matter of fact I can not understand the black cancellation on the back now. So I have to study it more.
I also want more common domestic cover for my collection and maybe it cost me much cheaper than 100CHF. I believe you can also enjoy Swiss Classics with small budget if you have knowledge.

Today I joined the meeting of the Japan Philatelic Society of UK.

Today I joined the meeting of the Japan Philatelic Group of UK. and decided to be a member.

I found this group interesting when I saw their stamp exhibition held a few months ago. One of my philatelic friends also introduce me to their members.

As I exhibited collection of Switzerland and German States in Japan, some of the members don't think I'm interested in UK stamps, however I used to collect stamps of UK and USA when I'm in Jr. high school and I like it. Today's meeting has no special agenda as usual, however I feel confortable because chat about Printing company such as De La Rue or another chat of Pre Stamp Cover interested me much.

In the event I was presented a literature of the Postal History Soceity of Japan and it was interesting. I like especially the article of "Seven Books on Local British Postal History" by Mr. Hoshina Sadao. This article help me making better my thematic collection of "development of stamp" . 

Reconstruction of Swiss classics

Upon making a collection of Switzerland, I decided to get along to actively re-construction in order to earn points of knowledge. You can classify all the positions and plates of the early Swiss classics with some good handbooks.

First I classify my RAYON3 stamps. RAYON3 was printed in sinlge color and one sheet contains 180 stamps, 18th copies of 10 original plate. So you can easily distinguish 10 types by checking the red background curve lines.

As a result I have 6 types out of 10 already as I show here, however I doubt if position 9 is genuine or not.

I'll continue trying re-construction for the other stamps also. It needs knowledge and study instead of money. I can enjoy it with the same price of the covers.

Decoding of pre-stamp covers

I started to collect stampless covers of Switzerland to understand  Switzerland classic philately much more. I've bought about 50 cover lots from Sqwitzerland and start studying them with the guide book of stampless covers published by Michel. Swiss Cantons of the age use different currencies and have each individual postal systems, you can enjoy domestic letters as if it is international letters. The Michel book teaches me "The paid amount is written at the back of the envelope while the unpaid amount is written at the front. "
When you see the cover below, you can see red  "6"  at the upper-right corner. I can understand this is the unpaid amount, however I can't tell the currency. The dealer said the currency is Kreutzer as it is sent in 1747 from the contents, but I need to study more. I have also difficulty in understanding where it comes from and the destination, thought the dealer said both of them are Zurich.

This cover is a folded letter and you can see "1747" at the top of the contents.

Begin to create sub-collections from the packet

When I was a Jr. high school student, I bought a packet of Belgium containing 300 different stamps as I ghought I might make some collection. From that packet I found so many faces of King Baldwin 1st that I remember the name even when I'm away from philately for quarter century.

By the way, I'm far from completing a stamp collection of Belgium. I can't even finish classfying the packet. My point of English at school was not so bad, however it is difficult to understand philatelic words of Scott and at that time, all the stamps are listed in monochrome color and only one image shown per series as today. Without friends and advisors collecting foreign countries, it was difficult to make collection those days as we don't have such literatures written in Japanese.

So what can I do today if I were in the same situation in this internet times? I have a chance to write an article of packet collection of Turkey containing 500 different stamps. I'd like to make an article which advices to myself living 30 years ago as a Jr.high school student. It's better for him to have fun in philately with small amount of money and I think such an article is needed in philately today to increase junior collectors.

Final day of Otemachi annex of the Ginza Post Office.

The opening day of the All Nippon Stamp Show was the closing day of Otemachi annex of the Ginza Post Office.

I sent the summer greeting shown yesterday with this cancellation and I also sent it to me by myself. I received it today because yesterday was holiday as well as Monday and the Post Office was not opened as the destination of the cover. It was rare for me to make such covers these days.

 

Summer Greeting

We have all Japan Stamp Show here in Tokyo now and this is the third time I exhibit my collection at this event.

This time I exhibited a work titled "All the Stamps of the World Until the Invention of Perforation".

As I thought philately is something like collecting culutural heritages, I'm going to exhibit ones willingly. The following is the list of the upcoming exhibition and I'll do my best.

Nov. 2-4 iphla2012 (Meinz, Germany) the international philatelic literature exhibition and I entried Stamepdia as web service.

Nov. 9-11 JAPEX2012(Ikebukuro, Tokyo) I'll try to exhibit something. I'll think about it from now on.

Nov.21-23 Japanese Southeast occupied area stamps (Mejiro, Tokyo) This is non-competititive stamp show organized by the occupied area stamp club.It's been 30years since I made the last exhibit work of this stamps.

Nov.21-25 Emirates2012(UAE) FIAP show. I'd like to entry if it is really organized.

Jan.19-20, 2013 Europex2013(Mejiro, TOkyo) This is non-competitive stamp show organized by Mr. Itabashi and me. I'd like to run it as my ideal style.

 

Regarding the Europex, we'd like to continue it once a year from 2013 with one theme per year and the theme for 2013 is Black sea.

There are seven countries around the Black sea and we're going to show the colleciton of those seven countries this time.

We are not only exhibit collections but also show some videos and ditigal archives so as to get more interests on philately.

 

By the way, I wrote several articles this half a year such as French Colonies Stamps on "Yushu" (published by JPS) and "the Egg-brown-six" on "Yushu-research" and "Hokuriku-Philately". I'm going not only to write articles but also to publish our new magazine "Stampedia Philatelic Journal 2012" in upcoming half a year.

 

 

2012 Midsummer

Stampedia Project

Takashi Yoshida representative

 

※ (image) what I bought impulsively at the stamp show today....

If you're in Tokyo this weekend...

All Japan Stamp Show has just started yesterday. The organaizer of this event has been Japan Post until last year and it's changed this year to the Philatelic Federation (Rengo). I'm surprised how it is improved in comparison to the ones until last year! It became much better. I appreciate all the people who works for the competition.

This year , the show is positioned as a gate for the international competition again and that makes the object of the event clear. As a result, the ratio who see the exhibit works increases, I think and the dealers stand has many philatelists seeking stamps and covers.

By the way, there are another mini pex held in Mejiro, Tokyo this weekend, until today. "Mitaka-Hosun stamp show" is a non-competitive stamp show with 30 works. I've been to the minipex last Friday, however I love to see again some of them.

Japan, Village-Send stamp  (Kenichi Hattori) * a local post started from the 17th century in Japan. I love it.

Japan, U-Koban  (Osamu Asai)

Japan, Cancellation in Tama (Hiroyuki Nagano)

Japan, International Letter Writing Week  (Yasuhito Kakihara)

Japan, Direct drilling roller cancellation (Morio Suzuki)

Japan, international covers and postcards with bilingual machine cancellation(Yuzo Yokoyama) 

Japan, express (Kigen Arai)

UK, Telegraph stamp(Tadakazu Ota)

World, newspaper stamps (Eisuke Uchinaka)

Mancuria  (Marcus Cousins)

Every time what I feel when I look at the mini-PEX is a regret that we can only see the works on exhibition. I can't remember them all and I hope we can get some scans of the works in digital some day.

The first panda stamp in the world -from my Chinese stamp collection-

Mr. Fukui, a famouse philatelists collecting Chinese stamps asked me if I collect Chinese stamps or not the other day. As a matter of fact, when I decided to start Stampedia project, the base of my collection was what I was given by my father who collected Chinese stamps for a long time. Besides I bought some Chinese stamps in my childhood because it was most cheap stamps at the stamp dealers.

Well I encountered the full sheet of 120 single 1959 Chinese stamps depicting panda besides the facevalue last month and I got it. It was not so popular and I paid only 100 euro. 1963 Giant Panda stamps are much popular and much expensive than this stamp, however this is the first Panda stamp.

So my answer for the first question if I'll collect Chinese stamps is half yes but half no because I'm not going to make a traditional competitive work of Chinese stamps as I don't have enough difficult stamps such as 1897 surcharged stamps or liberation stamps.

 

Greeting card in 1926

Emperor Taisho died on Dec.25th 1925, there are not many new year greeting post card of 1926, however most of the people got used to exchange new year greeting at that time, there are many postcards as substitutes for new year greeting ones. The contents starts with the word "We are in the darkness, but ..."

I started making postal history collection of Japanese post cards as my sub theme recently and I got interested in Emperor Taisho. I met these post cards last week.

Left) Toshima ??/Jan. 5th 1926 Circle Comb Cancellation

Right) Hakodate Jan. 8th 1926 Machine cancellation 

 

What you need in making exhibition works

I've almost completed 70 leaves out of 80 in all for the upcoming national stamp show. I get used to it as it's 5th time for me, however I feel fear sometimes for short of leaves, hinges and so on. I'd like to note something here.

Mount , Hinge and Self-adhesives for covers: you can only get these materials at philatelic store but no stationery store in your town. So you should always try to keep stock of these, otherwise you'll be shocked on the day before the deadline of sending the exhibition work.

Leaves: I make my collection on Pages, Apple software. This is one of the reason I forget the lack of leaves until two days before the deadline. I used to use Frank Goddon leaves before and it took me two months to import it from London just because of out of stock at the dealer. So it is very dangerous to use such leaves, I think.  Even at the international stamp competition, more and more A4 size leaves tend to be used, so I think it's time to changing the leaf size to A4. What is important in ordering A4 size paper at the stationery store is  to order (1) non-acid paper, (2) cream color but white one (3) thick paper (200g / meter square) I got one made in Austria in the stationery store in Ginza, Tokyo and each leaf costs me 20yen= 20cents.

Wraps: You are asked to wrap your leaves by vinyl clear pockets otherwise stamps jump out of the leaves while handling and exhibiting the collections. Stamps dealers have one but I recommend to use stationery store because it's cheaper (30yen=30cents) and easy to get at many places.

As a result, you'd better have enough stock of the materials you can only get at stamp dealers. Regarding all the other materials you should buy at usual stationery store and you should find which store has enough stock.

 

History of the Great Britain Postage Rates

I'm now making a collection which I'll exhibit at the upcoming national exhibition.I'm now researching some postal rates on the covers and I found a website Letter Rates 1840-1968 of G.B. Unfortunately it does not show the international rate of the classic period, so I have to research more....

The shown is an entire letter to U.S.A. franking 1840 Pence Blue, horizontal strip of 4. I'd like to know if 8 pence is a right rate for this letter or not...

1988 Tanzania International Red Cross 125th Anniv. 3shilling 16examples inflation cover ? to Japan

Oct. 22nd 1988  CITY DRIVE DARESSALAAM TANZANIA, Double circle cancellation.

The destination of this letter is The U.N. universtity in Tokyo.

I got it as I thought it's a kind of the inflation letters, however there are also possibility that it is just a letter with many low face value stamps. 

Stamp market

I've been to Marche de Timbres in Paris, Stamp Castle in Shanghai, however there're several stamp fleamarkets in Japan and I've benn to Stamp Market in Tokyo yesterday.
I was offered some covers with arrival machine cancellation and this is one of them, Roman-letter machine cancellation of Osaka. I like this cancellation.


It is also happy seeing friends again at the market and I found one of my best philatelic friends there yesterday of course he is much senior to me. He also offered me a nice international cover with trial machine cancellation of Kojimachi with the destination of Guam, USA.

The last example I show today is a special courtesy cover attached Commemorative booklet. I think it is very rare to attache such stamps on this kind of letters.

Stan deals catalog country has been increased to 31 countries.

 

Today we released our 31st country stamp catalogue of Slovakia and I'm happy to show you our history and the future.

The idea of Stampedia comes to me in 1989 when I met with database technology and at that time I'm not satisfied with traditional stamp catalogues. Since the I've been tried to use paper, Floppy and at last web as a media. I also started listing only Japanese commemoratives at first as I don't have so much money then, however now we're trying to list all the stamps of the world.

We started Stampedia on Dec. 1st 2009 with two country stamp catalogues of France and Monaco, so it's been three years since then and we've been trying to improve the existing catalogues alreadyreleased this year as some of them are in bad quality. Fortunately we've done a lot of improvement including philatelic classification this year and we're still doing it now.

From now on we also try to increse the quantitly. We'd like to have 100 country stamp catalogues by the end of this year and today we released Slovakia.

Thanks to the staff in our project, almost all the stamps are placed in the leaves and scanned and the data was cut into indivudual stamps at Viet-Nam and China by our co-operated company, as a result we possess images of more than 300,000 stamps with 1200pixel high resolutions.

We're the only organization who possess such a high resolution stamp images as well as stamps themselves, so some of the publishers asked us to lend our images for fees, however we have no plan to do so because our aim is to provide "Free Whole Earth Stamp Catalogue" to all the philatelists over the world and not for the other web services aiming to get money.

Last but not least, we'd like to show you our plan of the last half-year. The four big country catalogues will come and those are Japan, Turkey, Russia and Jugoslavia. Many countries became independent from the latter three countries, so it'll help increasing the number of country catalogues. Enjoy Stampedia!

 

 

2012 Japan New definitives High face value 350Yen and 500Yen issued on July 2nd, 2012

A friend of mine sent me these FDC covers to me. The machine cancellation is not usual for the registered letters. Thank you Mr.F and I'll give you some nice international cover later on.

Letter Pack Light vol.2

I sent a new letter pack light to the destination of general delivery just because I want a cancellation of the destination post office. I like this example because there are two kinds of cancellation and both of them are very clear and beautiful at right position. It seems it took two days to deliver (June. 30 -> July 2) , however it is just because July 1st is Sunday. 

By the way, today Japan Post issued two new definitives, 350 yen and 500 yen. As only half hundred post office sell these new stamps in Japan, I have no chance to get them in the morning and I've finally got it in the afternoon at Kyobashi Post Office near Ginza. I made some FDC, so I'll show them later days.

America'12 held in Japan

Today I've been to America'12 held in Tokyo. private stamp show of Japanese philatelist who collect stamps of USA. I'm not used to stamps of US just because I have little knowledge of the manufacute knnoledge of them, however, I can understand some of them as the defenitives between 1845 to 1954 is shown in this show.

As a general collector, I usually ignore the difference in manufacutring point of view, however it's more interesting to collect defenitives of some important countries with manufacuturing points and regarding stamps of US, I can study how to collect them.

By the way, I got a letter with machine cancellation of Yokohama P.O. sold at the show. it was just $3.5. very cheap, though the envelope was not clean as attached.

 

2012 Japan Stationery Letter Pack Light

I got many new blue "Letter Pack Light" today, which is to be sold at post offices when all the stock of the older one, red "Letter Pack 350" is finished.

I asked a clerk at a post office to sell me this new one if I buy 100 copies with success. I'm going to make some used one with a cancellation of June 2012.

1961 Japan Letter Writing Week HAKONE by Hiroshige Ando

This is an International Registered Letter to Germany, which is classified as the third rate area from Japan those days.

Europe, of course including Germany is now classfied as the second rate area from Japan, however was classified as the third rate area before. I think this is because there are no flight over the north pole those days.

 

Uruguay Japan Joint Issue

A philatelist I encountered at ebay.com sent me this envelope. I'm vey happy as I feel his sense as well as his hospitality to attache such stamps because I'm a Japanese.

 

90th Anniversary of Uruguay-Japan diplomatic relations established (Joint Issue), Block of four
Registered Letter to Japan, $154 
Cancelled "CORREO URUGUAY / 31 MAY 2012 / LOCAL PORTONES" (PORTONES is in English. Meaning of Gates)

 

Occupied Territories, Hong Kong, south

When I was in 8th grade, I exhibited a collection for the first time in my life which contains the stamps issued at the Japanese Military Occupied Area and I got Silver-Bronze medal then.
I stopped collecting them more just because I found super modern Japanese stamps and stationeries more interesting and I started collecting European countries after I started collecting stamps again, but I sometimes think about Japanese Military occupied area stamps and so I joined the club of this theme in Japan and this is the only philatelic club I join now in Japan.
Last weekend as I was busy enought not to go to Osaka, I joined Stamp Fleamarket which Mr. Takasaki held in Asakusa and there I got many Japanese covers. Among them I found the cover used in the Military Occupied Hong Kong. It is sold at 2,000yen (20 EURO) at the Tanaka-ya shop. I felt the cancellation is rather beautiful as it was not cancelled during the period but as it was only 20 Euro, I got it anyway.

When I returned home, I checked the other covers used and cancelled in Hong Kong and I upload the images as well.
Well what I got this time at 20euro is too much beautiful , but is it genuine or fake? How do you think about it?

17.1.22 Hong Kong (22th Jan. 1942)

Registered letter to Japan, Hong Kong 20.5.19 (19th May 1945)