Saunder's Gull (Larus saundersi) - maximum card from Vietnam, mailed later as a naked postcard (no envelope) to me by my friend Nguyen

I like very much this MC, my first from Vietnam. It was sent later, not on the date of the creation of the MC, but that's no problem.

It is really circulated thru the mail, from my friend Nguyen in Vietnam to me in USA - that's a rare thing for a maximum card.

Usually, maximum cards are not circulated as postcards, to avoid postal damage, theft, etc.

They are pure (maybe too pure), only for philatelic purposes, away from the harsh reality of the postal system.

There can be thousands of identical, Postal Administration-issued official maximum cards with a certain design.

But when you receive one as a traveled postcard, with "postal battle scars" maybe, then that is personalized to YOU, as a gesture of friendship between philatelists/stamp collectors. And the favor is returned, of course.

Even better is when you receive or send a UNICATE/UNIKAT/UNICAT maximum card, of which there is only 1 in the world, created by a collector/maximaphilist.

I like to send out nice items, too. Even very nice...

In fact, I should create a blog: "My REVERSE COLLECTION - stamps, postcards, postmarks and maximum cards that I HAVE SENT (not those that I received) to partners/friends from around the world".

In that blog, I will upload images from their online collections , and from my records of what I have sent them.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larus_saundersi