대한민국

A pleasant cover from South Korea here with two triangular stamps and a definitive bird stamp.

The two triangular stamps actually make up a souvenir sheet that was released 01 Aug 2007 and entitled "Philately Week Special." The S/S shows Korea's first stamps (5-Mun, 10-Mun). More info on the issue from the Korea Post website:

This year's special stamp issued to commemorate the "Philately Week" will take the form of "stamps in a stamp." The inner stamps are composed of a "5-Mun" unit stamp and a "10-Mun" unit stamp (Mun used to be a Korean currency unit), two stamps that were actually issued and used among the "Mun unit" series stamps, Korea's first stamps. In addition, this special stamp will be a photochromic stamp: a light-sensitive pigment which changes color when exposed to ultraviolet light is capsulated and applied to the stamp printing: The letter '???þ' on the two sides of the "5-Mun" unit stamp and the letter '???þ' on the two sides of the "10-Mun" unit stamp were printed with light-sensitive ink. As a result, the letters, which normally have no color, turn red when exposed to ultraviolet-containing sunlight. This special stamp will provide fun and delight to stamp collectors.

I really wish that the whole S/S was affixed onto the cover, but I guess that would take up too much space! But I am nonetheless very thankful to get such nice stamps on this cover, especially since the theme of the stamps is one of my favorites!

The smaller definitive on the left was issued on 17 Jan 2000 and is aptly entitled Definitive Postage Stamp (20 won). It depicts a black-crowned night heron, which is further described as follows:

The black-crowned night heron (Nycticorax nycticorax) is a summer migrant bird of the family Ardeidae. The bird spends the summer in Korea and flies to Southeast Asia in early autumn. About 57 cm long, both male and female birds look alike, with greenish-blue lustrous black heads and backs. It is white on the cheeks, under the chin, and on the breast and belly, while black on the beak and yellow on the legs. It builds nests on the branches of Japan cedars, pine trees or thickets of assorted shrubs, where it lays three to six eggs. This nocturnal bird roosts on rice paddies, ponds, and fields of reeds during the day and begins to hunt for food at night. The black-crowned night heron eats primarily fish, shrimps, frogs, snakes, and insects. This species breeds from central regions of Korea, Japan, Sakhalin, Eurasia, and Africa and spends the winter in Taiwan, the Philippines, the Malay peninsula, and Indochina.

Interesting how there is a mention of these birds in the Philippines, but I have never seen them here. Or maybe that's because I spend most of my time in the city.....

The cover as a whole is very neatly arranged with a very clear postmark and "AIRMAIL" franking and this is something to appreciate as most mails these days have unintelligible postmarks....

The cover was sent from Gang-nam-gu, a district in the Korean capital of Seoul, on the fourth of April 2008.