De Smurfen zijn komen

You may remember one of my very first blog posts nearly 2 years ago was about the Smurfs. Briefly - they were created by Belgian cartoonist Pierre Culliford (aka Peyo) in 1958. Of course they didn't become popular in the U. S. until nearly 25 years later with the cartoon series which began in 1981.

Translation:

"The Smurfs are coming to Delhaize Direct"

The Delhaize is our local grocery store. So local it's right across the street.

This is taken from our living room window. The Delhaize is the white building on the right. Did I mention we live over a pharmacy?

Here's the advertisement for this exciting event at the local supermarket . . .

This summer, Delhaize's world will turn blue. Honouring the release of Steven Spielberg's Smurfs movie on 3 August, the Belgian supermarket chain presents 28 figurines and 4 dolls for children to collect.

The action starts tomorrow and ends on 31 August, so children have a little over two months to let their parents fill the savings cards at the Delhaize stores: per 20 euro, the customer receives a stamp. 4 stamps is enough for a Smurfs figurine. Both the figurines and the dolls were made especially for the Belgian market, in a very small quantity.

Here's my "savings card".

Translation:

COLLECT THEM ALL!

. . . I'll try to.

As you can see the first line is in Flemish & the second is in French - like everything here because half the country speaks French and the other half speak Flemish (Dutch). Yep, there's a line right down the middle from west to east to separate it.

Keep in mind, Belgium - pictured above . . .

is less than half the size of W. Virginia - pictured below . . .

and yet one language just isn't enough.

Every time you spend €20 you get a stempel (cachet in French). So €80 and 4 stempels later and you have the equivalent of a 50 cent plastic toy.

But that's not the point! This is the Belgium Beanie Baby equivalent and we collected those for a while although I have no idea where they are now.

And once we've spent a smooth €800 at the Delhaize (and that is not difficult) plus remember to take our handy "savings card" for a stempel, we will be the proud owners of a $2.00 stuffed Smurf-figuurtjes.

But you can't get 'em anywhere else.

What a bargain. I'm in.