Prodded by Londonbus and his
Gibbons chocolate bar (I am envious, it should have been auctioned :)
I have dredged up an old yarn from 1984.
Apologies are in order : I have not noted the author, but
I think it may be one of my favourite journalists Les Winnick
from Chicago.
This time the Exhibition vehicle was Sugar Sachets and all the collectors were nicking the sugar packets...I'll let Les carry on :
A few of the NABA sugar packets with stamp reproductions.
them. You should have seen me gulping down coffee after coffee, just to get the packets. It almost gave me a
heart attack. I had to drink the coffee black and bitter, because no way was 1 prepared to tear up the packets and
use the contents. Can you imagine tearing in half a Sitting Helvetia or an Orts-Post?
"No way: I am a philatelist, sir!"
I should not complain, though. Other people drink coffee without sugar as a matter of principle. The Chinese,
wha are recognised as possibly the best cooks, have invented sweet and sour pork. You are supposed to dash a
sprinkling of Worcester sauce into your Bloody Mary, and Campari is not all that sweet either. So 1 carried on
gulping bitter and hot till I remembered saccharine.
I kept the sugar packets as they came. Naturally, I could have slit the top with a razor blade and used the sugar.
First of all my electric shaver was quite useless for this task, and secondly it would have been very wrong.
There are Some basic rules in philately. You don't soak off the gum on mint stamps, and you don't keep it on
used copies. Yes, I know the Swiss Postal Museum washed off the gum from their classical Swiss, mainly
blocks, but I have not yet reached Museum levels.
No, I kept the packets intact, pristine, mint, as is right and proper. I completely forgot about stamps and went
chasing after the sugar packets, and still I could not complete my set of 20. Fortunately, there was a press
conference and, afterwards, lunch. They brought a supply of sugar packets for the insatiable media, a big box of
them. 1 confess without blushing that 1 scrounged as many as I could. I was not the only one. A certain
prominent airmail collector from London picked up all the sugar packets with the five francs airmail stamp. 1
think he wants to corner the market.
My secret hoard is 55 packets, and 1 was very lucky. I had no idea what I stuffed into my briefcase, but in the
end I managed to put together one complete set.
Posted 05/21/2010 10:57 am
