http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/12/09/san....ap/index.html

<font color=skyblue>North Pole, Alaska.

They get letters from around the world and the letters do not even have to have postage to be delivered, as the post office has decided to offer that service for free.

A few years ago, one person mailed in a $1000 and told them to "put it to good use".

The townspeople volunteer to answer as many as they can as long as a return address is included with a pregenerated reply, but a reply nonetheless.

I think that's cool that they do that. </font>

So who is paying for this?

I think there was something like this in Finland for quite some time. Where all the letters addressed to Santa go...

EDIT: googled for the webpage.
http://www.santaclausvillage.info/

[ 12-09-2006, 11:02 AM: Message edited by: ZFR ]

You mean... there is no Santa?! [img]graemlins/crying.gif[/img]

There goes my whole belief system... [img]graemlins/confused2.gif[/img]


I really think this thread should have a spoiler warning... [img]graemlins/verysad.gif[/img]

The Postal Office does the same thing in Canada. You write to: Santa Claus, North Pole, H0H 0H0 Canada. There's about 11k volunteers, they reply in 22 languages and braille. Every letter with a return adress get a reply.

They talked about this once on TV and said every letter was read and they looked to see if any children confessed to being abused or anything like that. Apparently children often confess things to Santa, and they can often track down abusive families this way.

One thing I think that's neat is that if you use "track this letter" option it show it going all the way to the North Pole.