In Ireland it’s €2.20 now to send postcards when I started postcrossing in 2017 it was €1.35 so I’ve had to decrease the amount of postcards I send now.
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That’s interesting. But I wonder why there are so many Chinese and Taiwanese and Japanese… Because I have Taiwanese origins, and before knowing Postcrossing, I thought that no one liked to write postcards either. I asked some Chinese about how they know Postcrossing, most of them answered “thanks to social media”. So it means it became “trendy” for young Chinese (at least, that’s how I understand it).
It is possible that if it becomes trendy for some reason, South Korea becomes a huge Postcrossing country…
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I work in Denmark but I almost never send postcards from Denmark as postage for postcard ( and letter upto 100 gr) for outside Denmark is about 5 dollar/ Euro !!! 
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I’m so happy I can send trough German post because I live close to Germany. Netherlands is to expensive for my taste. 1.55 euro. However I remember in 2014 when I started when the German post was 75 cent international. I hope it will stay at 95 cent… I really pray for that.
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I have got one card from South Korea. It was one of the winter Olympics. I thought that was really cool. I cherish that card.
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This is really horrible! No wonder they do not participate - even with cheap or moderate prices it is not a cheap hobby at all, if you want to send a few more than one postcard per month!
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Germany right now -,95€ for an international postcard
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For Chinese and Japanese, their population is bigger than Korea’s. I cannot explain about Taiwan, though. I also hope more and more Koreans to be interested in Postcrossing but who knows 
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Is English a required subject in Korean schools?
Postcrossing for 11 years, 584 cards sent, 582 received. I have sent 2 cards to Norway, no officials received (though I now have a pen pal in Norway so that’s exciting). Nothing official sent or received to Sweden. I received my first card from Iceland earlier this year (and sent one in 2014).
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Yes, from elementary school to high school.
Thanks for that fascinating history about IYS - those are the kind of cultural differences that can make a big difference in explaining why some countries are more active than others.
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As far as I know, the post system in Taiwan is more stable. Every registered international mails I sent to or received from Taiwan was treated fast and efficient by Chunghwa Post. (At the same time, it will spend much more time during its journey in China…)
Chunghwa Post is still working in many fields in the society of Taiwan. Official documents (like the notification of military service) will be sent from the government via Chunghwa Post. So everyone is used to have an available mailbox at the door. When one wants to mail something out, he/she tends to go to the post office. Besides, Taiwanese are more open to communicating with the world. There are many activities of postcards swap set for students in middle schools.
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I definitely feel the pain of the Norway postage costs. It costs about 3.25USD to send a postcard (plus postcards themselves are expensive here). May explain lower volumes from Norway, along with the small population.
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Finland has also small population and large country. So there is actually most postcrossers in Finland than in any other country if you compare to population.
We have just always been letter and postcard writing nation. We have always sent and received postcards at birthdays, namedays and every possible occation. Ever since 60’s/70’s we started to teach English to everyone at schools. And that IYS pen-pal service was introduced to us at school. We have had postcards at every shops and stores. There are couble of large postcard suppliers and lots of postcard artists. Of cource nowadays not so much as there used to be. For example common tourist card are only at large cities. It is not profitable elsewhere. I needed to print my own Nokia-cards because so many postcrossers wishes a card from a home town.
If you look at closely postcrossers’ amount I think there are actives about 1/3. Couble of years ago I did the math in Finland region by region and that was the result. So, if it is same in other countries, then there are not so many in Sweden and Norway.
About stamp prices, they have risen terribly past years and now first time we have the rise second time this year. Next week one stamp costs 2,10 €. It is same to Finland and all over the world. Abroad there is also priority 2,25 €, but it is not needed because traveling time is not any faster.
Edit: since April 2023 one stamp is 2,30€ and priority to abroad 2,50€.
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We just need a few of the BTS Army to start PC, and then it’ll explode 
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I’m laughing irl reading this. Fan base of K-pop are mainly outside South Korea tho and they can be toxic (especially on twitter 
)
Back to topic, I think introduction of snail mailing and postcrossing at school could be a great idea. Judging from the number of teachers and their postcard projects in the forum, many of them are from big 5 countries such as Russia and USA
Perhaps if there are more teachers in rare country put snail mailing culture in their classes, it may give a bit introduction of it. At least here,some teachers still introduce students about postal service and writing letters, but they’re only taught to send letters to their own homes
I really think teachers are the key of introducing this hobby to younger people 
especially if we want this hobby to stay exist
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Thanks for more of Finland’s history & cultural practices around mail & postcards - it’s very helpful to understanding why Finns are so active in Postcrossing.
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Postage in Norway is very expensive. Since the 90s I have sent all penpal letters from Finland as we used to live near the border. Now we live close to Sweden, and try to pile up when going there, as postage is also cheaper from there. I always bring penpal letters with me for mailing when travelling abroad, and sometimes use travel mode, but MOST postcrossing cards are sent from Norway, as mentioned in this topic, cards from Norway are rare. Too bad I still can only have 28 cards travelling at the same time. I request a new address as soon as my cards are registred. Lately most cards are registred very slow, but that`s a different topic 
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