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Birthday Gift — Pelikan Classic M200 Café Crème Ef

Tom Kellie

By Tom Kellie
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Tom Kellie Donor Pen

Tom Kellie

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~ 2019 began with two vintage Pelikan fountain pens on my writing desk with no plans for any others.



During the year a half dozen more made their way from Fritz Schimpf in Tübingen, Germany to me in southern China.



More than one week before my 66th birthday a long-time friend gave me a Pelikan M205 Translucent Blue Italic nib pen.



All of that resulted in a bustling little nest of nine Pelikans, which far exceeded my expectations.





Yet that wasn't the conclusion of 2019 Pelikans, for the families of my Hong Kong students gave a surprise a 66th birthday party.



One guest was my former student at Peking University, ZHU Jinjie, who has travelled with me to East Africa for Leopard behavior field observation.



His presence alone would've been gift enough, yet he presented me with a pair of gifts, as shown below.




Tom K.





fpn_1572941781__students_at_a_birthday_p



Students at a Surprise Birthday Party




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ZHU Jinjie with a Gift




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Two Gifts




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Bookmark and Pen Box




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Made in Taiwan




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Nib Bookmark




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Pelikan Presentation Box




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Pen Identification Tag




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M200 Café Crème




fpn_1572942569__pelikan_classic_m200_caf



Pelikan Classic M200 Café Crème EF




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Birthday Gift




fpn_1572942714__pelikan_ef_nib.jpg



Pelikan EF Nib




fpn_1572942774__tanzanite_note.jpg



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Misfit Museum Piece

Misfit

Posted
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What a wonderful experience.

 

I have a Cafe Creme too. It’s a very attractive pen. I had put only brown ink in my until I needed a wet writer for Sailor Ink Studio 123.

 

Enjoy yours.

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Beechwood Donor Pen

Beechwood

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Hi Tom and a very happy birthday, many more to come I hope!

 

What a lovely gift, very thoughtfull. I do think that the Cafe Creme is such a good looking pen, I bought one when it first came out and love it.

 

It needs a nice brown ink and some cream paper, perhaps Montblanc Toffee?

 

All the best

 

G

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Bo Bo Olson Ancient Artifact

Bo Bo Olson

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Very nice pen....I do like the springy regular flex and 1/2 a width narrower than modern nib.

Because its a tear drop tipping leaves a nice clean line.

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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inkstainedruth Ancient Artifact

inkstainedruth

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Congratulations! I wish I could figure out what I did with my second one (the first one, along with another pen and the case they were in, got lost on a trip down south a couple of years ago. I tried calling the hotel a couple of times but they said the case wasn't turned in. I got lucky on finding a used one on eBay, but can't figure out what happened to it. I seem to recall sticking it somewhere but it hasn't turned up.

It really is a gorgeous color combination. And you have clearly made an impact (in the right way) on your students, for them to do such a nice thing.

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

"It's very nice, but frankly, when I signed that list for a P-51, what I had in mind was a fountain pen."

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Eccles Vintage

Eccles

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I sometimes kick myself for not nabbing one of these when they came out; a beautiful pen indeed.

Tom, I hope it brings you much pleasure and great memories for many years to come.

Glenn.

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Lam1 Collectors Item

Lam1

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Happy birthday, Tom!

 

That your students hold you in such a high esteem speaks a lot about the teacher and person that you are.

 

Congrats on your new Pelikan and the beautiful bookmark.

The Cafe'-Creme is one of the most beautiful M200, IMO.

You have quite the flock now!!

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Misfit Museum Piece

Misfit

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I searched for the Cafe Creme, and saw some on eBay and Rakuten.

 

I got mine from pencils.jp last year.

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Calabria Collectors Item

Calabria

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My Cafe Creme also came with an EF that wrote EEF. Wonder if that was part of an Asian release,

 

I wish my students were so appreciative!!

"If you can spend a perfectly useless afternoon in a perfectly useless manner, you have learned how to live."

– Lin Yu-T'ang

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Runnin_Ute Museum Piece

Runnin_Ute

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My Cafe Creme also came with an EF that wrote EEF. Wonder if that was part of an Asian release,

 

I wish my students were so appreciative!!

I got my Cognac from a Japanese seller (F) and it seems to write more like an EF. I wondered something similar.

Brad

"Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind" - Rudyard Kipling
"None of us can have as many virtues as the fountain-pen, or half its cussedness; but we can try." - Mark Twain

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DrDebG Antique

DrDebG

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I just saw this post! What wonderful gifts! And what wonderful students! You must have been an outstanding professor to have such dedicated and caring students!

 

Happy Birthday and may you have many more like this one!

"Today will be gone in less than 24 hours. When it is gone, it is gone. Be wise, but enjoy! - anonymous today

 

 

 

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  • 1 month later...
Eccles Vintage

Eccles

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Tom, your lovely gift finally stirred me into buying my own Café-creme, coincidentally, from China.

A beautiful pen.

Glenn.

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Bo Bo Olson Ancient Artifact

Bo Bo Olson

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Posted (edited)

The 200 is a narrower nib (is the old vintage, semi-vintage traditional widths) than the rest of the modern post '97 Pelikans.....so would expect a narrow nib to be fairly narrow.

I asked Fritz for the narrowest EF he had in stock, and it was a good EF.....on line with my vintage pens that I've started using.....finally. I have no EEF, nor want one yet. A vintage EF width does all the editing I need to do. ( :unsure:...I am still a bit heavy handed.....making my BCHR Osmia 76 Supra (maxi-semi-flex) write to a F instead of the EF it will do with a lighter hand.....like my wife has.)

 

There is always going to be size variance with in tolerance, I'm glad you lucked out and got an EF on the narrow side of tolerance

Edited by Bo Bo Olson

In reference to P. T. Barnum; to advise for free is foolish, ........busybodies are ill liked by both factions.

 

 

The cheapest lessons are from those who learned expensive lessons. Ignorance is best for learning expensive lessons.

 

 

 

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sansenri Donor Pen

sansenri

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In itself, a pen is just a pen.

It is something different when it is what the donors know you will like, and is a sign of their appreciation for you and what you mean to them.

That is where the value is in your cafe creme

Happy birthday!

Edited by sansenri
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  • 1 year later...
Tom Kellie Donor Pen

Tom Kellie

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~ As it turned out, this Pelikan M200 Special Edition Café Crème EF birthday gift has remained one of the most cherished fountain pens on my writing desk.

 

The unfailing reliability, precision strokes, exceptional nib feedback, and sturdy construction have surpassed all expectations.

 

This evening one of my dearest long-time friends from Kailua, Hawai’i and Marrakech, Morocco asked for a fountain pen recommendation for one of his elder brothers.

 

I enthusiastically recommended this model in EF, based on my positive experience with it.

 

         Tom K.

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IThinkIHaveAProblem Vintage

IThinkIHaveAProblem

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That is a REALLY good looking pen!

 

I'm glad it's been such a good friend to you and has such a good origin story! 

 

Just give me the Parker 51s and nobody needs to get hurt.

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Muncle Extremely Rare

Muncle

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That is a gorgeous pen, and what a wonderful story. I am glad that the pen has been a good companion as well.

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