Plates

Years ago when I first started to travel, I, like most everyone else, wanted to bring home a souvenir of my trip. What to bring? I wanted something that would fit in my suitcase, not weigh too much, not cost too much and still be a nice remembrance of where I had visited. I decided to pick up a good china plate from every country. I started off with a bone china plate with a Mountie on it from Canada. I had an Aynsley plate from England with Windsor Castle on it. From Switzerland I brought back a beautiful plate with a blue gentian painted on the front – that’s a small blue flower that is found in the Alps and still used occasionally for medicinal purposes. Cedar trees graced the front of a plate from   Israel and the Greek Key was featured on a plate from Greece. In Holland a Delft plate found its way into my suitcase and in Denmark a Royal Copenhagen plate made it home with me. A plate from Turkey was covered in graceful calligraphy. I think it reads “Allah is great”.

This went on until I had quite a collection.  Not only did I have plates from different countries but I had commemorative plates as well – mostly royal – don’t forget I’m from Canada. What to do with them? I decided to hang them on the wall -not very original I’m sure, but this was long ago, when I was young.

The older I became and the more countries I visited, the more plates I collected. I had to have a carpenter come in and build a plate rail around my dining room. Then I had to have him build one around my upstairs hall. I was overrun with plates. And still I bought them. Not only was I collecting, but all my friends were collecting for me as well.

My uncle had a summer house near Athabaska, north of Edmonton, Alberta. He told me there had been a plate in the house for years, and did I want it. I said sure, I’d love to have it. When the plate arrived I looked at it with interest. It was a commemorative plate with dates and names on it and the words, “England expects every man to do his Duty”. The dates were from the 19^th century. I finally realized this was a commemorative plate from the Boer War. It’s still hanging on the wall.

But the oddest plates I ever received, and the ones that caused hoots of laughter from everyone who saw them, were a pair of plates from the North West Territories in Canada. Relatives out there had heard that I collected plates and told me they had a pair in the shape of polar bears. Was I interested? I said I sure was, and to send them to me post haste.

My sister was with me when we opened the parcel. To this day I can still see the look of bewildered surprise on her face as we peered under the tissue paper expecting to see china plates. My cousins in the Northwest Territories were truckers. When anyone mentioned a plate collection to them, they immediately thought of license plates.  And that’s what they sent me –  a pair of Northwest Territory LICENSE PLATES and they truly were in the shape of polar bears.

They became my prized possession and I displayed them proudly above the window in my kitchen and whenever anyone mentioned my plates, I always took my company to the kitchen to show them the plates I liked the best.