There is something I have to share with you all, although it may sound as if I am just complaining.

Ive just returned from Collector's Fair that has been advertised as the biggest event of such kind in our region. I live in quite large city (when measured by European standards) with 1+ million inhabitants. The fair is organized by biggest collector's association in town. So now you should have the scale of it and understand that if not here, then there is not much more to do when searching for collectibles here. I do not count local auctioning site which right now lists 60 (sixty!) "collectible" writing instruments with more than half of them being sets of modern plastic rollerballs with some company logos on them...

OK, so here is the list of pens I've found on our Collector's Fair after searching through around 80 stands. Here it goes. I hope dial-up users can cope with a list that long. Here:

1. heavily used Hero 329 in black, no box
2. ... and nothing more
3. errr... .REALLY, that was the only one

The entrance fee was probably the worst spent $2.5 this week It's not just problem of pens. Overall, many of the offered items were modern ones "tuned" a bit so that they look older than they really were. I believe it is the problem of Poland being in the middle of WWII with so many items destroyed, stolen, hidden somewhere for eternity or misplaced in another manner. It's just sooooo sad. But still, the post-45 items should be available. But they aren't. And the situation with pens is just pure tragedy. It's good there is this forum and.... there is eBay - yes, it's a source better than none.

I am going to Paris in September. I hope I will find some collector's event there Any suggestions where to go there?


BTW. The guy asked $15 for that Hero... I could not help it and laughed aloud. Just couldn't help it

I can sympothize with your frustration. I live in the U. S., in Pennsylvania, and there is nothing within a hundred miles of my home that even resembles a fountain pen seller. Even if I travel the distance, there si nothing to guarantee that I wuld find anything interesting, unless I call ahead and make plans to buy a specific pen. But there would be no shopping for a bargain. It surprizes me that a city of one million souls would not have better FP selections, but I can understand it. This frustration is why I also like the Internet. I have much more available to me in this virtual world than in real life.

Good luck in Paris. If I were going to Paris, I would plan to see Mora Stylos (spelling?).

Finansista is right. Every time I go for a walk and visit local antique shops I find nothing... Sad but true. It's high time time to think about moving to country full of FPs