Special thanks to Terence for this wonderful pre-stamped postcard from Lhasa, Tibet. Lhasa is the administrative capital of the Tibet Autonomous Region. The Potala Palace which stands on the Marpori Hill, is shown on this postcard. The imposing Palace was the chief residence of the Dalai Lama until the 14th Dalai Lama fled to Dharamsala in India, during the 1959 Tibetan uprising. It is now a museum.
The Potala Palace is again portrayed on the red circular cachet applied on the back of the postcard. It also indicates that the Potala Palace is UNESCO World Heritage Site. The second red cachet is a Tibetan greeting: tashi delek (བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས), tashi meaning auspicious and delek meaning fine or well.
Terence completed his postage with a 4,50元 stamp about the 'Protection of biodiversity'. Note that the word 'Lhasa' on the date stamp is both in Chinese, 拉萨, and in Tibetan, ལྷ་ས་.
Mailing date: 13 December 2011
Delivery date: 5 January 2012
Hi David,
ReplyDeleteIt’s great to visit your stamp site here. What I know about the Potala Palace is that it was once the main residence of the Dalai Lama (up to the 13th). There’s a white palace (living quarters) and the red palace (place for religious studying and praying). The 14th Dalai Lama went to India when there was a Tibetan uprising in 1959. It’s currently a museum and a UNESCO World Heritage site.
I visited one of my favorite online stamp catalogues and tried to find the stamps you have here from Tibet. It seems that StampWorld.com does not have a lot of Tibetan stamps in their catalogue. I shall inform them of these new stamps so that they can include it in their site.