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From Hangzhou with love: Miss Sweet Water's 2010 postcards
By Xu Wenwen |
December 30, 2009, Wednesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
LET 2010 be a year of warmth and staying in touch" - that's the New Year's resolution of Stella Wu, a 21-year-old hotel management student in Switzerland who's home for the holiday. And she's loaded with Italian postcards.
Since Saturday (Boxing Day), she has been mailing them out to people in China who responded to her post on Douban.com.
Her post started with this: "Sending a postcard is a virtue, so ask for postcard from Miss Sweet Water." That's Wu's name online.
The cards bear pictures of beautiful landscapes, mountains, sunsets, valleys, the seaside and peacefully grazing animals. She tries to find the right picture for each person whose response "touches" her.
On each card she writes: "2010: Let's keep looking for warmth and touch."
Anyone who follows her thread and says something touching or describes a moving event may get a postcard. It's all subjective, but it needs to be "enough to touch Miss Sweet Water."
Wu is now a student in hotel management in Cesar Ritz College in Switzerland. The postcard enterprise enlivens her winter vacation at home.
Two days later, on Monday, she got hundreds of threads, all warm words posted by total strangers. That's far more than she expected; she only bought 30 postcards from Italy.
"Everyone has different ideas about what's emotionally moving," says Wu. "I prefer words that are sincere and touching, or words that can bring pleasure and let us reminisce when we close our eyes."
She cites the example written by a young woman: "Everyone has many warm stories. I love to read them and feel warmth. Maybe I'm so selfish that I'm trying to steal some warmth from reading them. So please let me, lonely me, feel some warmth too."
Miss Sweet Water replies:
"You are actually not alone as long as you think you are happy; you are actually not alone when you observe that there are friends who care about you. You could be the heroine of a warm story as long as you want to be. 2010: Let's keep looking for warmth and touch."
Here are online posts from a few people who received postcards:
"When I get the card, my voyage of the spirit will begin. Someday I'll look for the landscapes on every postcard and travel there on my own."
"From today, be happy. From today, I'll contact all my family members and tell them I'm happy."
"Do what I insist on doing - it's not a wish, nor a promise, it's a pursuit forever."
Wu chooses postcards with pictures appropriate to the messages. A blue seascape represents calm, the bright sun represents happiness, mountains stand for ambitious goals.
She writes the standard words, blesses the cards, places stamps on them and mails them through the regular post.
Wu has gotten involved in another postcard activity - collecting postcards to cheer a woman whom she does not know, a woman who is dying of cancer. Wu joined the efforts of Summer, a young woman in Huanggang, Hubei Province, who wants to collect 1,000 postcards for her friend's mother.
Summer considers one postcard to be one blessing; more postcards will encourage the woman to lift her spirits. Summer contacted Wu and asked for a card. Wu sent a card with a picture of calves sucking milk from their mother cows.
Miss Sweet Water wrote: "I believe your goal of 1,000 cards is not far away, both your friend and her mother are strong, and I'm so glad to be one of the 1,000."
Many readers post threads expressing thanks, not asking for cards.
Here's one: "In the chilly winter I feel warm because of these touching words and Miss Sweet Water." Wu was touched for a long time.
Sometimes people send private messages to tell life stories or share emotions they cannot express to their best friends. They need a nice stranger to be a sympathetic listener.
The 30 postcards from Italy will be mailed by the end of the month, but Wu says the joyful postcard movement will continue.
When she returns for the spring college term, Miss Sweet Water will buy more postcards in different countries: Some will be blank so that she can draw her own pictures or print photos she took overseas.
To ask for a postcard from Miss Sweet Water, go to www.douban.com/event/11395335/.
Since Saturday (Boxing Day), she has been mailing them out to people in China who responded to her post on Douban.com.
Her post started with this: "Sending a postcard is a virtue, so ask for postcard from Miss Sweet Water." That's Wu's name online.
The cards bear pictures of beautiful landscapes, mountains, sunsets, valleys, the seaside and peacefully grazing animals. She tries to find the right picture for each person whose response "touches" her.
On each card she writes: "2010: Let's keep looking for warmth and touch."
Anyone who follows her thread and says something touching or describes a moving event may get a postcard. It's all subjective, but it needs to be "enough to touch Miss Sweet Water."
Wu is now a student in hotel management in Cesar Ritz College in Switzerland. The postcard enterprise enlivens her winter vacation at home.
Two days later, on Monday, she got hundreds of threads, all warm words posted by total strangers. That's far more than she expected; she only bought 30 postcards from Italy.
"Everyone has different ideas about what's emotionally moving," says Wu. "I prefer words that are sincere and touching, or words that can bring pleasure and let us reminisce when we close our eyes."
She cites the example written by a young woman: "Everyone has many warm stories. I love to read them and feel warmth. Maybe I'm so selfish that I'm trying to steal some warmth from reading them. So please let me, lonely me, feel some warmth too."
Miss Sweet Water replies:
"You are actually not alone as long as you think you are happy; you are actually not alone when you observe that there are friends who care about you. You could be the heroine of a warm story as long as you want to be. 2010: Let's keep looking for warmth and touch."
Here are online posts from a few people who received postcards:
"When I get the card, my voyage of the spirit will begin. Someday I'll look for the landscapes on every postcard and travel there on my own."
"From today, be happy. From today, I'll contact all my family members and tell them I'm happy."
"Do what I insist on doing - it's not a wish, nor a promise, it's a pursuit forever."
Wu chooses postcards with pictures appropriate to the messages. A blue seascape represents calm, the bright sun represents happiness, mountains stand for ambitious goals.
She writes the standard words, blesses the cards, places stamps on them and mails them through the regular post.
Wu has gotten involved in another postcard activity - collecting postcards to cheer a woman whom she does not know, a woman who is dying of cancer. Wu joined the efforts of Summer, a young woman in Huanggang, Hubei Province, who wants to collect 1,000 postcards for her friend's mother.
Summer considers one postcard to be one blessing; more postcards will encourage the woman to lift her spirits. Summer contacted Wu and asked for a card. Wu sent a card with a picture of calves sucking milk from their mother cows.
Miss Sweet Water wrote: "I believe your goal of 1,000 cards is not far away, both your friend and her mother are strong, and I'm so glad to be one of the 1,000."
Many readers post threads expressing thanks, not asking for cards.
Here's one: "In the chilly winter I feel warm because of these touching words and Miss Sweet Water." Wu was touched for a long time.
Sometimes people send private messages to tell life stories or share emotions they cannot express to their best friends. They need a nice stranger to be a sympathetic listener.
The 30 postcards from Italy will be mailed by the end of the month, but Wu says the joyful postcard movement will continue.
When she returns for the spring college term, Miss Sweet Water will buy more postcards in different countries: Some will be blank so that she can draw her own pictures or print photos she took overseas.
To ask for a postcard from Miss Sweet Water, go to www.douban.com/event/11395335/.
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