Light House - Glow in the dark: Malaysia MS

Malaysia, which is mainly surrounded by water bodies has many light houses

dating  back to 15th century.  Most of them are erected by  Portugese,  Dutch

and  British.  To commemorate  these  historical  Light  houses,  Pos Malaysia

has issued two series of Light houses.  

The first series was issued in 2004 and the second series was issued in 2013.

I recently received miniature sheets of Light Houses of Malaysia (both series)

from Mr. Joel.

  

Tanjung Tuan Rumah Api(Cape Rachado Light House):

Tanjung in Malay means Cape and Rumah Api means light house.  Tuan Light House is in Cape Rachado, Malacca, Malaysia.  This Light house was originally built by the the British in 1819 and again rebuilt in 1863 after it was destroyed in a war. It was renovated time to time and a modern concrete tower was built in 1990 with RADAR facilities and the tower was painted in white. It is the oldest active light House in Malaysia.  It flashes 3 white lights every 15 seconds (*).

One Fathom Bank (NEW), Selangor :

The current One Fathom Bank lighthouse is actually the fourth lighthouse, built in the vicinity of the sandbank.  It was built in 1998 and the tower is painted with red and white.  It flashes 4 white flashes every 20 seconds. The specialty of this MS is it glows in the dark.  A nice addition to my theme "Unusual/unique stamps".

The older lighthouse is still their at 500 meters away from the new one and Malaysia issued a stamp of the older light house in Light House Series I.  The old light house is preserved well due to the historical values.  

(*) - The duration, color and length of the flashes are used to determine the lighthouse. These are well documented.

World Record Stamp - Belgium

Belgium is a country in Western Europe. While Belgium reminds most of us of Waffles, Chocolates and Beers, for me and most stamp collectors Belgium reminds us the Chocolate Stamp, World Record stamp, Thermochromic stamp and  Of course beautiful engraved stamps. I always wish to add Belgium Chocolate stamp, 2013 100years of RMI Thermochromic stamp and the World Record stamp to my Unusual and Unique stamps collection. One of my wishes came true through a Post Card swap with Mr. Johan. He used the non denominated bpost's 2014 Women's Day World Record stamp on the card. The 2014 bpost's Women's Day stamp has set a world record for the most number of words on a stamp.  A woman's face is designed exclusively with gridded words and the background is with digital micro texts. It set a Guinness World Record for most number of words on a stamp.  The stamp has 606 complete words in four languages.  The words are taken from the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women(CEDAW). CEDAW is an International treaty adopted by United Nation General Assembly in 1979 and came into force in 1981.  

I like the card for Johan's neat hand writing.  It seems that he has tried to replicate the small letters in the stamp!

The non denominated Women's Day stamp made my day.

Finding Nemo: Taiwan

I am a great fan of Pixar Animation Studios.  I have seen almost all of their movies half a dozen times. Bug's life and Finding Nemo are my favourites. When I came across the Finding Nemo Miniature Sheet, I realized that it has a circular shaped stamps too which comes under my theme Unusual/Unique stamps. So I picked up one.  I am talking about the 3rd April 2008 Taiwan Post's miniature sheet based on the movie  Finding Nemo.  They have issued two miniature sheets, I got one and am looking for the other MS.

Nemo is a small clown fish.  When it swims near the surface of the water it is caught in the fishing net and the story revolves around his father searching for Nemo and How Nemo escapes from the dentist's fish tank and reunites with his father.  Even though Nemo and his father Marlin are the key characters of the movie, I like the Dory, a blue reef fish, with short memory but with unbelievable talent ( Yes! it knows the Shark's language:-) ) and really a cool fish. I heard that they are going to release a sequential "Finding Dory" MS in 2016. Even though the turtles came for a brief part in the movie, they make a strong impression.

Below is one of the miniature sheets. Note that there are circular as well as rectangular stamps featuring the characters from Finding Nemo.

Slovenia - Austria Joint issue - Postojna Cave

Thanks to Mateja for sending this lovely stamp on cover. Another great addition from my want list. I am looking for Austrian side issue. If any of you ready to trade Please contact me through snail mail.

Postojna Cave is located in Western Slovenia and it is a network of 20 Kilometers of Passages, Galleries, Chambers and of course, a Post office. It is the largest cave in the "Classic Karst". Karst means landscape formed by the dissolution of a layers of soluble bedrock, such as limestone or dolomite. This cave was first discovered in the 17th century and opened to the public in 1819.  

The cave management asked Austria to open a post office inside the cave.  In 1899 August 15th, Austria finally opened the first underground cave post office in the world, near Kongresna Dvorana 500m inside the cave from the entrance. Until 1911 the post office was operated only on special occasions. Even during WWI the underground post office stayed open and continued to operate till 1927.

After the Annexation of this cave to Italy, in May 1927  Italy replaced this stone post office with a new building 1.4 Km away from the entrance.

In the last 196 years, more than 3.5 crore people visited the cave and the Cave Post Office.  It  is the most visited cave in Europe. 

At first the mails carried the special cancellation "Adelsberger Grotte - Postojnska Jama" and after it came under the Italian authorities it carried "Postumia (Grotte)" special cancellation. 

Even though the cave is in Slovenia, Austria Post opened the First under ground cave post office. So no wonder that Slovenia and Austria joint hands to issue the Joint MS on this historical Postojna Cave on 6th April, 2013.

In 1872, railway lines were laid in the cave and railway cars were pushed by the cave guides. Then they used gas locomotive to carry the tourists. In 1884, electricity connections arrived. Today, tourists take the electric train.

The cave was used for many purposes.  It was used as a storage room, a hideout, a bunker, and of course a concert Hall.  During World War II Germans used this cave as a fuel depot.  Since the Italians took all the maps of the cave, the Germans with limited knowledge about the cave were not aware of the back side entrance and they didn't guard it. The partisans took this opportunity to enter the cave through Crna Jama and used the artificial tunnel dug by the Italians to enter the cave from behind and set the fuel alight.  The fire took seven days to die out and it destroyed a huge part of the cave.  After the war, the cave became part of Yugoslavia and remained so until Slovenia gained independence in 1991, making it officially a part of Slovenia.