Reply Letter to a Friend in Poland, May 2020

May 24, 2020

Another day and many new letters arrive;

And in a quiet moment, early morning preferably, I go about reading and replying to them.

Those are letters we share with pen pals in many countries, all over the World, via the magic of the neat Slowly App. A modern day take in the traditional penpal experience, developed and maintained by a small team in Hong Kong.

This was sent just this morning, and will reach the Web via my Blog post way sooner than the actual letter (which doesn't have the added pizzazz of imagery and links included) reaches its destination.

The Header image shows a fragment of a Classic painting of the famous Wawel Castle, in KrakÃ³w, Poland. Courtesy of Wikipedia's page for the Castle.

And the Letter Starts :

Hello S.,

Good morning and thank you for your reply letter! I am glad you liked the Trinidad and Tobago stamp, it's indeed a wonderful, cheery and bright design, one of the best of all Slowly ones. I got it from a random purchase on the Stamp Store World Explorer, and loved it so much!

It displays the Pink Ibis, which is an protected, endangered species.

That got me into collecting coins and trying to buy one more per day, doable; I am getting even more coins now, since I started using a timer, set to 15 minutes, and running together with the Slowly app on my cell, while I do real work in my laptop. Buzz — I switch the phone, click for the video ad, and once it's over reset the time and drop the phone, back into other tasks.

The stamp in this letter is another nice one – again a lucky draw from the World Explorer, this one a few months ago. There's not any new sets of stamps that I would like to buy at the moment, I bought many over time and specially near Christmas, when they were on sale for 20% off, 80 coins per set.

I looked up your collection and noticed you did not have this Cameroon one, so here it goes. :) It displays the beautiful Cameroon Monument of Reunification.

Thanks for the offer of sending more stamps and sets, I appreciate it. My collection grew quickly when I joined Reddit SlowlyApp sub, but like you I think it's more enjoyable and satisfying to add to it Slowly – and enjoy each new stamp, a thrill when a letter arrives with one, isn't it ? :)

The High Schools curricula and choices available to students do vary widely, here we have 8 credits per year now (and for the last 25 years at least, I believe), so 4 credits per semester. I think that allows students more time to concentrate in each of the 4, unlike on the older times when they had 8 per semester like you mentioned.

Attention spans and focusing are a major problem, with young people getting bombarded with too many stimuli – and suffering a lack of attention and concentration capability.

Unfortunately, that is a reality and they will need to learn and find ways to cope and reduce the distractions – essential for higher level employment with better possibilities in a very competitive world.

[ Says me, who has 3 full Firefox browser windows open, each with a number of tabs; but this is needed as I do work in different communities and need to move from task to task efficiently. ]

I frequently cite and recommend an excellent article at The Atlantic – “Is Google Making Us Stupid ?” which I think is good reading and relevant.

The idea of pursuing an interest for History of Art is a nice one – if you can combine that with some employment to get started and earn a living, that would be gratifying. I personally love History too, and would enjoy if I got involved into a History of Technology programme myself.

Ah, pity that your computer is so far, hopefully you might get access to one — as I suggested to a friend in chat yesterday, Slowly Web mode, being a web based application, runs on a Browser window with no software installation required. You could use a shared, Library or office computer to access it, read and reply to the mail, and then just make sure to close the browser to erase your login to Slowly.

If possible to open a Private Tab browser window, that would be best for Privacy. Closing it will erase history and any cookies left by the Slowly Web mode run.

Good luck with future endeavours, we all go thru phases when things are like that, on the move and in uncertain directions. :)

Wonderful to have the friends visiting, and to prepare that special meal, a treat to them and yourself. I love to travel and experience Culture, Food and local History, Geography, it's so interesting.

Thank you for the good wishes, I return them with my own – that you and the family stay well and enjoy good moments in this Spring.

Till next time, sincerely,

Yann2.

Famous Last Words

Special thank you to all the folks behind the SLOWLY app.

Letters we share, with pen pals all over the world. A modern day take in the traditional penpal experience. Come and join us, using SLOWLY.

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