I got to write this only now while being in Brittany. I started writing postcards from the places I travel to. The places I consider my nomadic destinations.

Postcards as a medium were somehow always interesting to me. When I was growing up, there was still such a thing as sending a postcard for a birthday or just to celebrate a holiday - Merry Christmas, Happy Easter... But I wasn’t someone who would write postcards, up until the time I was introduced to it while on a company trip by someone who is very dear to me. 

When I travel, I try to send postcards to my family and friends. I noticed that it’s different compared to sending a message or a call. I guess it’s normal as it has become a rare form of communication.

It takes time to write a postcard, especially if you are trying to write something more than “sending greetings from Sicily, weather is nice, can’t wait to see you”. I need to get to know the place first, sense its beauty and sense something that is worth sharing with others. I want them to learn something about the place I am visiting, it does not have to be much. I want them to see a little bit of what I see, even if we all see things differently. 

I always try to think of a person I am sending the postcard to. For example, if I am sending it to my grandmother, I try to think of different religions or traditions, something that is close to what she might like. I try to open myself, and sometimes it is the deepest I can go, always depending on the emotional capacity or connection to the receiver.

We visit places and tick our checkboxes, or we buy those large maps that we scratch like lottery numbers, only to say, yay, we have been there. But what does it give us? With each travel, every new destination, it leaves something within us. We only don’t have time to realize and understand what it was. When will we realize this? Writing these postcards can give us time to reflect on the place we visited, it can organize our thoughts.

A postcard to myself

Unsure whether I can call it a tradition as it just started but I am trying to write a postcard to myself from time to time. Whatever it is you want to tell yourself right now from the place you are at. I try to reflect and note down things that I wonder about and thoughts that cross my mind or force me to overthink.

I think I am becoming a postcard collector

The minimalist in me dies immediately once I see a beautiful/ meaningful postcard in a store. Shoot. I bought it again, I have only been to 3 destinations so far, however, I cannot help it. 

Azorean postcards

Sicilian postcards

Breton postcards