i never cease to be amazed at the tenacity, patience and determination of plant people, in this case, some of my seed customers.......
my russian customers continue to astound me!!!
they order seed and pay good money even though each shipment is literally "russian roulette" (it might get there, it might not).
and so used to the reality of the situation, it is as though they don't give a second thought to it---grateful if they get the seed;
not even letting me know most of the time, when they don't. something unheard of from customers elsewhere.
just yesterday i received back (to receive it back is in itself highly unusual) a mailer to one of my very devoted moscow customers--sent in September, 2010, returned to me February 11th with "unclaimed" stamped on the envelope. all was correct (address, etc) and we have no idea why it was returned. but on speaking to my customer about re-shipping it, she just said "oh, i am happy to hear that. i just assumed it had disappeared in the postal system."
and this little story warmed my heart:
a long standing scandinavian customer with whom i had ongoing payment-on-line issues over the years, necessitating all sorts of back-door methods for paying his orders....around christmas i received a card and letter in the mail from him. firstly he wanted to thank me for my help & patience over the years. secondly, he wanted to tell me "he" was really a "she" and giving me her real name. thirdly, the reason: just having been released from a (very) long witness protection program---which posed problems with credit cards and other "official" matters. her children grew up while in the program and no matter the effort, she was not deterred about continuing to create gardens and going through whatever extra effort was necessary to obtain the seed in non-traditional ways.
