Stamp collection.... a dying hobby?

Commemorative stamp
Malaysia-China Diplomatic Relations


Hobbies are something you enjoy doing and may come to regard them as a form of relaxation. Besides reading, stamp collection has been my hobby since primary school. I used to keep the stamps received via letters sent to me or my friends. In fact I used to have penpals from Burma, the Philippines, UK and Singapore and we exchanged , what else but stamps. I supposed in this digital era, stamps are no longer ubiquitous as they used to be. And they will become rarer by the day.

Current modes of communication by SMS, e-mail,fax and handphone with 3G and skype, are gradually pushing the stamps into antiquity! Letters and documents are now mostly sent by courier service and even if they are sent through ordinary mail, they now use the franking machine, that sterile chop which replaces good old stamps. No wonder kids nowadays hardly know about stamp collection. To enable you to collect stamps now you need to register as a member of the philatelic club established by Postal authorities and need to pay upfront for the stamps which they issue regularly. This itself acts as a barrier for kids to collect stamps.

I arrange my stamps according to subjects, such as birds, fruits, marine life, insects, science/technology and according to countries. I used to get many foreign stamps during my official and personal travels and from colleagues working with the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF as they traveled to many countries and would get stamps from those countries for me. Now I get foreign stamps from a specialty shop in the capital city. I am particularly fond of stamps from China. They are designed beautifully with interesting subjects and are printed on high quality paper, unlike years ago! Some of their stamps , especially those on animal zodiacs fetch a high price on the market . Special edition UK stamps are also my favourites.

Whenever I want to relax, I will look at my stamp collection... yes, a thing of beauty is a joy forever.