Canada: Victoria with Margaret Atwood Stamp

On 15th December I got three postcards: one from Canada, one from Austria and one from Japan.

The card from Canada shows the inner harbour of Victoria in British Columbia. Victoria was founded in 1843 and is named after Queen Victoria. It is the capital city of British Columbia and Canada's southernmost major city. 

Some great stamps were issued in 2021: Mother Hulda in Germany, Napoleon in France, Pokemon in Japan, Classic Science Fiction from the UK, Star Wars Droids from the USA and three Postcrossing issues to name just some of them. Another stamp I was hoping for for years was issued by Canada Post on 25th November. It shows the famous Canadian writer Margaret Atwood. Margaret Atwood was born in Ottawa in 1939. She began writing at the age of six, but it was until the early 1960s that she gained her first successes. Since then she has won numerous international awards and honors for her writing including two Booker Prizes, the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the Governor General's Award, the Franz Kafka Prize, Princess of Asturias Awards and the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. Included on the stamp is an excerpt from her poem Spelling (you can find it online), but her most famous work is of course The Handmaid's Tale. The book is among my favourites and I also really like the TV adaptation and the sequel novel The Testaments. When this stamp was revealed on issue date, I watched the launch ceremony online live from Canada (you can find it on YouTube). It was funny to hear how much they joked about Atwood being honoured with a stamp before her death. Also she said that she was a stamp collector herself in her youth and that she hopes that also younger collectors will enjoy the stamp. Great to have this stamp for my collection, now I just need to find time to read Oryx and Crake. Two more nice stamps were used on the card as well. Next to Margaret Atwood is another inspiring and also still living woman, Buffy Sainte-Marie (issued 18-11-2021). Buffy Sainte-Marie is an Indigenous Canadian-American singer-songwriter and in 1983 became the first Indigenous person to win an Oscar for her song Up Where We Belong written for the film An Officer and a Gentleman. Below is a cute Christmas stamp with a portrait of Santa Claus (issued 01-11-2021). It is one of four Canadian Christmas stamps of this year. The others show portraits of an Elf and a Reindeer and an Angel over a Church. 

Thank You very much Tristan!