COVER N. 212 -  FRANCE

Postmark: Service des Oblitérations Philatéliques - 24 - Boulazac - 07.02.2023

Posted on the 7th February; Received on the 9th February 2023

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A very French cover, with a great aviation related stamp and another with the immortal hero of the first comic book I ever read in French (or at least tried to read... it all began with the title... what the hell was a bouclier...) ... Monsieur Asterix, le Gaulois. What's not to like?? Thank you so much, Roland, for another great cover!

There was a time when West and East united to fight a common foe (although it took the foe to break the deal it had with the East....but, better late than never).

Russia and the Russian people would bear the brunt of  Adolf's narcissistic neo-Napoleonic delirium, and all help would be welcome... Roosevelt signed the lend-lease act in March 1941....under it the Soviet Union received much needed help in the form of food and military supplies, from uniforms to aircraft, tanks, ships.....to fight  against a foe that had invaded its territory...(oh, the irony?....)

France had been occupied. Brave members of its fighting forces had joined the Free French Armed Forces. De Gaulle sent pilots to Russia to form a Groupe de Chasse (Fighter Group) operating with Soviet equipment... internationalism at its best....

The group was firstly called Normandie, to honour its origins but later Stalin added the Niemen in reconnaissance of the fact that the Group had bravely fought in the battle of the Niemen River.

French Pilots in Soviet made Yak 1s…

Once there was a brutal, imperialistic foe and a great patriotic war was fought and won.

They say that history repeats itself, don't they?

- On 01SEP2017, celebrating the 75th anniversary of the creation of the Normandie-Niémen Fighter group, La Poste and Russian Post issued a joint commemorative issue.The French stamp, in-taglio printed with a face value of 1,30€, is the one on my cover, beautifully illustrated with the image of two pilots, a French and a Russian, the coat of arms of the Group and an image of its iconic aircraft, the Yak 1.

Of note is the fact that although part of a joint issue, the Russian counter part is totally different, in that the same composing elements - pilots, aircraft and coat of arms - are presented as if images of golden sculptures over a reddish background.

- Le Bouclier Arverne...I must have been 10 or 11, because that's when I started to have French classes at school. There were a few French officers at Santa Maria, Azores, at the time, and I made friends with the children of the commander... that's how "Le Bouclier Arverne", by Goscinny and Uderzo came to my bedside table, I think ... a discovery....and probably weeks of effort, since every other word had to be checked in the dictionary...later I would read the whole lot in the Portuguese translation thanks to libraries and friends and my own pocket money. 

Goscinny and Uderzo created a fabulous set of characters for the Astérix stories, but there's another character that came out of the pen of Goscinny that I was absolutely nuts about: Iznogoud, the Grand Vizier...

On 02DEC2009, La post issued a souvenir sheet comprising six 0,56€ stamps with images of some of the main characters in the Asterix adventures. Further to the man himself, featured in the stamp on my cover, the sheet contained stamps illustrated with images of Assurancetourix, the poor bard who does his best to provide high quality musical entertainment during the banquet that always closes the story, Panoramix, the druid, distributing his fabled magic potion to a line of dwellers of that small village in Armorica whose inhabitants only fear that the sky might fall upon their heads,  Falbala, the beauty that makes Obélix blush, Idefix, the little dog mascot of Obélix, and Obélix, the gentle giant who fell into the cauldron of the magic potion when he was a baby.... 

The stamps are obliterated by a perfectly applied postmark as befits le Service des Oblitérations Philatéliques at Boulazac.