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Post by migo984 on Sept 18, 2015 12:36:40 GMT
The United Kingdom is a country that includes England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Its official name is “United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.” England, Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland are often mistaken as names of countries, but they are only a part of the United Kingdom.
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checkrail
Crayons
Posts: 20
Looking for Penpals?: Yes. Global penpals welcome
Country I live in is: ScotlandGB
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Post by checkrail on Sept 18, 2015 13:09:00 GMT
A lot has to do with how someone in GB/UK/the British Isles (even) describes his/her main identity or might prefer it to be described in a different political dispensation. There are subtleties too: the name United Kingdom refers to the collective union of England, Wales and Scotland with Northern Ireland, not the union of England, Wales and Scotland with each other, which is Great Britain.
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Post by writingrav on Sept 18, 2015 18:34:21 GMT
A lot has to do with how someone in GB/UK/the British Isles (even) describes his/her main identity or might prefer it to be described in a different political dispensation. There are subtleties too: the name United Kingdom refers to the collective union of England, Wales and Scotland with Northern Ireland, not the union of England, Wales and Scotland with each other, which is Great Britain. I'm lost already! As long as the letters get there I'm ok.
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Post by chojo on Sept 18, 2015 18:49:51 GMT
Can anyone across the pond explain why some of my correspondents use United Kingdom, others Great Britain and some England, in their addresses? Does it matter? As far as I'm aware it really doesn't matter, I think it may depend on how they feel about the union, I know a lot of scots that will only ever use Scotland as they don't want to be part of a United Kingdom. I also heard heard tell of folks who won't use Great Britain as they either, A. hate the monarchy and feel that GB relates too much to the days of the empire or B. Just don't think we're that great anymore. Me personally, I tend to use UK mostly because I believe we should be United and the fact that I always have and don't feel the need to change. On the other side of the coin is there a reason why some folks on your side only ever put U.S and others always U.S.A?
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Post by sharmon202 on Sept 18, 2015 22:53:33 GMT
Can anyone across the pond explain why some of my correspondents use United Kingdom, others Great Britain and some England, in their addresses? Does it matter? As far as I'm aware it really doesn't matter, I think it may depend on how they feel about the union, I know a lot of scots that will only ever use Scotland as they don't want to be part of a United Kingdom. I also heard heard tell of folks who won't use Great Britain as they either, A. hate the monarchy and feel that GB relates too much to the days of the empire or B. Just don't think we're that great anymore. Me personally, I tend to use UK mostly because I believe we should be United and the fact that I always have and don't feel the need to change. On the other side of the coin is there a reason why some folks on your side only ever put U.S and others always U.S.A? I never thought about this. As far as I know there is no difference or any reason why someone would feel there is a difference. I will be interested to see if someone thinks there is something to this.
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Post by writingrav on Sept 18, 2015 22:55:24 GMT
As far as I'm aware it really doesn't matter, I think it may depend on how they feel about the union, I know a lot of scots that will only ever use Scotland as they don't want to be part of a United Kingdom. I also heard heard tell of folks who won't use Great Britain as they either, A. hate the monarchy and feel that GB relates too much to the days of the empire or B. Just don't think we're that great anymore. Me personally, I tend to use UK mostly because I believe we should be United and the fact that I always have and don't feel the need to change. On the other side of the coin is there a reason why some folks on your side only ever put U.S and others always U.S.A? I never thought about this. As far as I know there is no difference or any reason why someone would feel there is a difference. I will be interested to see if someone thinks there is something to this. I suppose it's done, but I've never seen anyone just put US rather than USA. Shouldn't make a difference, though.
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Post by skye on Sept 19, 2015 1:12:24 GMT
I never thought about this. As far as I know there is no difference or any reason why someone would feel there is a difference. I will be interested to see if someone thinks there is something to this. I suppose it's done, but I've never seen anyone just put US rather than USA. Shouldn't make a difference, though. Before I moved here, I mailed letters to "United States". *shrugs*. Those letters always arrived to their destination
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Post by thatauthor on Sept 25, 2015 14:27:28 GMT
Actually "The Doctor, Ossett possibly, Yorkshire" has actually got to me once!! Did you ever get the chameleon circuit working on the TARDIS?
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Post by alc3261 on Sept 25, 2015 16:19:36 GMT
Actually "The Doctor, Ossett possibly, Yorkshire" has actually got to me once!! Did you ever get the chameleon circuit working on the TARDIS? I am indeed a Dr Who fan which was why this letter impressed me - I get so much post that the Postmen of Ossett all know me. However the letter in question was in fact from a patient (I'm a psychiatrist) so I was glad they did not have my actual address!!
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Post by thatauthor on Sept 25, 2015 16:23:05 GMT
Did you ever get the chameleon circuit working on the TARDIS? I am indeed a Dr Who fan which was why this letter impressed me - I get so much post that the Postmen of Ossett all know me. However the letter in question was in fact from a patient (I'm a psychiatrist) so I was glad they did not have my actual address!! Can totally understand about that! My wife is a psychotherapist and definitely wants to have a big big wall between her work and personal realms.
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Post by chojo on Sept 25, 2015 18:47:46 GMT
Did you ever get the chameleon circuit working on the TARDIS? I am indeed a Dr Who fan which was why this letter impressed me - I get so much post that the Postmen of Ossett all know me. However the letter in question was in fact from a patient (I'm a psychiatrist) so I was glad they did not have my actual address!! I am indeed a Dr Who fan which was why this letter impressed me - I get so much post that the Postmen of Ossett all know me. However the letter in question was in fact from a patient (I'm a psychiatrist) so I was glad they did not have my actual address!! Can totally understand about that! My wife is a psychotherapist and definitely wants to have a big big wall between her work and personal realms. So we have a psychiatrist and a psychotherapist's husband... well I'm just a plain old psycho and I've got both your addresses Mwah ha ha (sorry that's supposed to be an evil laugh but I'm useless at impressions).
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Post by thatauthor on Sept 25, 2015 18:53:05 GMT
"So we have a psychiatrist and a psychotherapist's husband... well I'm just a plain old psycho and I've got both your addresses Mwah ha ha (sorry that's supposed to be an evil laugh but I'm useless at impressions)." Just steeple your fingers and repeat after me: "Excellent."
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Post by ladytiger7647 on Sept 27, 2015 11:49:46 GMT
Can anyone across the pond explain why some of my correspondents use United Kingdom, others Great Britain and some England, in their addresses? Does it matter? As far as I'm aware it really doesn't matter, I think it may depend on how they feel about the union, I know a lot of scots that will only ever use Scotland as they don't want to be part of a United Kingdom. I also heard heard tell of folks who won't use Great Britain as they either, A. hate the monarchy and feel that GB relates too much to the days of the empire or B. Just don't think we're that great anymore. Me personally, I tend to use UK mostly because I believe we should be United and the fact that I always have and don't feel the need to change. On the other side of the coin is there a reason why some folks on your side only ever put U.S and others always U.S.A? I think USA is more about national pride and patriotism which US does not imply. To me it just looks and feels right. United States seems a little vague too since many countries are made up of united states it's just not associated with other countries since each state in the US has it's own government.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Oct 24, 2015 22:18:10 GMT
I've never understood WHY some folks get so tetchy about being classed as living in the United Kingdom....I often get the impression they've just got a daft chip on their shoulder about something petty and pointless in the grand scheme of things and it's often down to politics I guess which is something I have zero interest in When I used to do a lot of postcrossing I would often write USA on the address instead of United States of America (usually just because of space issues) - is this ok or is it more 'polite' to write the latter rather than 'just' USA? I've often wondered if I'm unwittingly kind-of 'insulting' my American penpals by writing the shorter version I tend to write United States of America in full on envelopes as you have a lot more space than a postcard
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Post by Chris on Oct 25, 2015 0:38:58 GMT
Think about who processes and sorts the mail for each piece of the address. You generally should address things in such a way as to be most intelligible to that locality.
For example, in the US, addresses are written from most specific down to most general, with the last line (for international mail) being the country it's going to. For mail sent from the US, unless the country is CANADA, the US postal service does not read and does not care about anything that appears above it. However, they must be able to parse the country in order to send the mail to its next hop.
So, you should write the country name in English (e.g. GERMANY and not DEUTSCHLAND) and in all capital letters without punctuation. You should also use the country names that the USPS recognizes, which does not include UK or UNITED KINGDOM. Although these often work because people know what you mean, the exact country is preferred (ENGLAND, WALES, etc.) and I have sometimes seen mail returned when addressed to "UK".
Since the city usually won't be parsed until the letter has arrived in the appropriate country, it makes sense to use the local version of the city name, e.g. "Den Haag" and not "The Hague". Similarly, use street names in the local language (and local script is fine too, if sending to a country whose language doesn't use the Roman alphabet) because the local post office will have to figure out what to do with it.
I can't speak to preferences for sending from other countries, but the general idea is that you should use whatever your local postal service prefers to see for the country, since they are the ones who have to get it headed in the right direction.
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