Today the picture is more about the thing itself. I wanted to include a picture of this because it's one of my all time favourite things. I bought it in a remote Romanian village somewhere on the outskirts of Cluj-Napoca but I'm afraid I can't be more precise than that. We had stopped at the home-atelier of this amazing carpenter who not only made huge pieces of furniture but also these small beautiful toys and games. There was only one road through the centre of the village and it was deserted. Suddenly, this odd little woman came walking up the street shouting very loudly in a language I didn't understand. As she walked, people in all the shuttered up houses along the street came to their front doors and listened to her as she passed.
Apparently, it turned out, that this was the woman from the post office, the town crier, passing on the telegram messages to everyone in the village. In a very public way, but maybe there were no secrets to keep in a village like that. I thought it was really amazing and this toy reminds me of that. And 15 years later it is still in as great condition as the day I bought it - and that's more a testament to the durability of the thing and the skills of the craftsman than it is of my ability to take care of things.
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