You can brighten the holidays for someone far from home
By Caitlin Finlay
More than 2,000 Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) members are currently deployed on missions and will be serving far from their friends and families during the holidays. Sending holiday greeting cards to our troops is one way to show our appreciation—and to remind them that someone is thinking of them this holiday season.
You can send a Christmas card or even a letter to any deployed CAF member somewhere in the world by sending it, addressed to “Any Canadian Armed Forces Member,” to a central address in Belleville, ON; the CAF will sort the cards and letters and distribute them among the various missions and regions around the world. You can send as many as you like, though each will need a stamp to get it to Belleville.
If you choose, you can specify that you want your cards to go to members serving on a given mission; for example, to get cards to those serving on Operation REASSURANCE, the mission to support NATO in Europe, you would add “OP REASSURANCE (eFP Latvia)” under “Any Canadian Armed Forces Member.” You can find a list of mission names at the bottom of this page.
Only letters and greeting cards are allowed—no parcels are being accepted, though Canada Post is generously providing the free delivery of letters and parcels sent to deployed members by family or friends.
The cards have to be received in Belleville by December 9 so they can be distributed to the troops in time for Christmas.
A Twitter post on the “Canadian Forces in the US” account reads: “Many of us will spend the holidays with our families. Many of us will not. It would mean a great deal to us if you sent them a greeting.”
To send a holiday card to our troops, address it (stamped) to:
Any Canadian Armed Forces Member
PO Box 5004 Stn Forces
Belleville, ON
K8N 5W6
If you don’t plan to send holiday cards this year but want to show your appreciation, you can post a virtual message to our troops on their message board.
For more details: https://t.co/mHEf2AA6Df.
Photo: iStock/demaerre.
