šŸ˜ˆ Naughty Lists: What Not to Mail

Understandably! :open_mouth: Thatā€™s a large latte with an extra shot of espresso here! Keep it for yourself! :relaxed:

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Germanyā€™s smallest banknote it 5 ā‚¬. Nothing to just send away.

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Very interesting topic!

Itā€™s not just Uganda. Ireland, Turkey, India, Sri Lanka, Guyana and other countries do not accept shaving brushes from Japan.
It is likely due to the anthrax cases associated with shaving brushes in 1914-1917.
World War I required the soldiers to have a clean-shave to fit their gas mask tightly. Badger-hair brushes became hard to come by due to the war, and replaced by horsehair-brushes imported from Japan that is thought to be the cause of the outbreak.

Itā€™s not Japan prohibits export to the US, itā€™s US bans hoverboard imports, more precisely Segway is claiming patent rights.

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Interesting how long some regulations stay in force! :astonished: That was more than a hundred years ago with the shaving brushes, and some of those countries didnā€™t even exist at that time (probably inherited from the British colonial administration). And Segway no longer existsā€¦

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The medical brief on anthrax-infected shaving brushes is fascinating; I had no idea! :open_mouth: Iā€™m always amazed to see seemingly unrelated chains of cause-and-effect build up into something historically (and in this case, medically!) significant, so significant that it affects postal restrictions a century later! Thank you for sharing, @Chieusa! :heart:

And @shugal, I was also unaware of the ā€œoriginalā€ Segway PT going extinct until you mentioned it; I suspect this affair went largely under the public radar because it had long been dismissed as a bygone curiosity. (And, you know, there were more pressing matters in June of 2020. :sweat_smile:) Even in its nascence, Segway mail delivery was kind of a bust, and Iā€™ve yet to find any recent updates on their latest attempt at parcel delivery technology in the midst of a pandemic.

The restrictions on plant matter donā€™t surprise me at all ā€“ Southern California for one has had a huge problem as long as I can remember with inadvertently-imported plant diseases and harmful insects, and what with still having a large agriculture industry we can get hit pretty hard. Citrus especially seems prone to both of these, and itā€™s still a major crop here. We are also not allowed to take any citrus fruit across our state line.

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I hope the ban on musical cards gets expanded to be worldwide!

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Yes I heard a story on NPR about thisā€¦we have the kinders that are divided and each half covered in plastic. And apparently the ones here in US arenā€™t as tasty either.

Maybe that is how the murder hornets ended up here!!

Did someone kindly tell me what is forbidden in Holland? I put a small hand-knitted item in the envelope for my pen friend in Holland. I saw so many prohibited items that I didnā€™t think there was any problem, and now I am full of worry about that envelope

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Worry no more, @Qingshun! Unless your gift was radioactive or alive, it should be fine! :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

Here is what the USPS, the Royal Mail, and FedEx have to say about mailing to the Netherlands. As far as I can tell, there are no prohibitions on knitted items.

How sweet of you to send a hand-knit gift to your pen pal! Iā€™m sure he or she will love it. :heart:

These are two different products, tasting completely different. Kinder Surprise and Kinder Joy In Germany we have both, with Kinder Ɯberraschung (Kinder Surprise) far more popular, which also reflects my personal taste. No idea why the US government thinks the toy in Kinder Joy is less dangerous than the one in Kinder Surpriseā€¦ :thinking:

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If mailing to Iran/Iraq, no pork products! Donā€™t use a box that had pork in it. Yep, get it.

I

Iā€™m perplexed by this oneā€¦anybody else?

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I love Kinder surprise more than Kinder Joy has a two different packages for girls and boys and I donā€™t like this kind of packaging.Maybe every girl doesnā€™t like playing with fairies right?Kinder Surprise only has one package.And Kinder Surprise more tastier for me

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Yeah definitely.When I was little my uncle was buying to me and my cousins a lot Kinder chocolates and Kinder Surprise eggs.I still keeping some toys from Kinder eggs.

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The pink and blue packaging! :joy: Iā€™m with youā€“assigning genders to kidsā€™ toys is really silly. Kids want what they want; sometimes it aligns with social expectations, and sometimes not. I certainly played with lots of pink, sparkly fairies as a kid, but I also enjoyed ā€œboyā€ toys, too. :roll_eyes:

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They do it with kinder surprise, too. There is the classic neutral one and then there is a blue and a pink version. I donā€™t like it eitherā€¦ Iā€™ve only bought the classic neutral ones for my daughter!

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The original poster asked about Canada banning "An issue of a publication in which more than 5 percent of its total advertising space is primarily directed to a Canadian market* from the mail.

I think I know what this is about, although this is not 100% certain.

Some U.S. magazines are, or have been, printed in regional editions with different advertisements. So, for example, a chain of restaurants or stores which only operates in part of the U.S. could buy ads that would be sent only to the appropriate region of the country. Or, for example, a Chevrolet ad could say ā€œVisit your local Chevy dealerā€ and list the California dealerships in issues sent to California, the Texas dealerships in issues sent to Texas, etc.

Naturally, some U.S. magazines might want to publish a regional edition for Canada with advertising from Canadian businesses. However, the Canadian magazine industry was against that. They wanted Canadian advertisers seeking to reach a Canadian audience to advertise in Canadian magazines, not a Canadian edition of a U.S. magazine. And so the Canadian government sought to prohibit the importation from abroad (especially the U.S.) of magazines with advertising directed at the Canadian market.

I am not sure how this worked out after NAFTA and then the USMCA, nor do I know whether the Canadian government would have accepted U.S. magazines being printed in Canada and mailed from there to Canadian readers. But Iā€™m fairly sure that this ban was about protecting the Canadian magazine industry from American competition.

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Seems like a reasonable explanation to me!