Stamp Terminals | Teaser Photo | My Partner wants me to get a passport | New Locations

OUR STAMP TERMINALS  
All readers will recognise our stamp dispenser terminals. They come in black and white.  They’re elegant, low-prim and with our logo on the front they’re easy to recognise.

You may not have encountered all of the other variants yet, so here are some photos

Terminal Variants

Fantasy, Slenderman & Mer

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One is unique — the special Bellisseria Slenderman edition. You’ll have to brave his gallery to see that one up close — and he does not make it easy to find! The undersea variant — rusty and flickering — is to be found at Mer locations. Then there’s the latest type — for homes in Fantasseria — the magical sub-continent of Belli.  

Watch out for all the different styles and always check for our logo before complaining that one doesn’t work. The basic design is available full perm on MarketPlace and others use it too around the grid for various purposes — so that thing you’re clicking with no result may not always be one of ours! 

STOP PRESS: You heard it here first, folks. More new designs of terminals, including wall-mounted plaque-type variants, are in development and will be available Soon®. 

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TEASER PHOTO

No clues, but also coming Soon®.

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MY PARTNER WANTS ME TO GET A PASSPORT

My friend Daphanie Dolphin phoned me frustrated and wanting to blow off steam. She'd had a fight with her husband Flipper. He wanted her to get a Bellisseria Passport so they could travel together to exotic places of interest and collect interesting passport stamps.

While she loved the idea, she really can't afford a premium account right now. Besides, she lives with Flipper in their lovely houseboat and didn't want to get another home just for the passport. 

She told as much to Flipper. He was not very understanding. He just did not seem to "get" her concerns.

I am not asking you to move out.. just to get a passport.

But getting a passport means I need a Linden Home… which means paying 11.99 a month for a premium account. I just cant afford that.

I never asked you to get a premium account.. just get a passport.

But you can't have a passport unless you have a Bellisseria address... and I don't.

She paused. Then suspicions began to run wild.

Is this your way of saying you dont want me to live with you anymore? Are you breaking up with me?

No I am not breaking up with you! I just want you to apply for a passport so we can travel together. It sounds like a fun hobby and I would like to do it with you!!

I stopped her at that point. Like a good bureaucrat, I put her on hold. I checked with the BBB office for our policy on spouses/partners and passports. The policy is: if your partner owns a Bellisseria home and you are officially partnered in SL, then you qualify for a passport using your their address.

I took Daphanie off hold and told her the good news. She let out a squeal of delight, then put me on hold (but forgot to push mute). I guess she isnt a true bureaucrat! I could hear her telling her partner the news and then all sorts of kisses and smooching. At that point I hung up, satisfied that once again bureaucracy had saved the day.

The story shared is true except that the names (and most of the facts) have been changed to protect the innocent. The one part that was not changed: If you are partnered with a Bellisseria Home Owner, and that partnership reflects in both profiles, then you do qualify for a Bellisseria Passport.

Article and photo by Teresa Firelight 

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NEW STAMP LOCATIONS

This week there are five new locations where you can collect stamps for your Bellisseria Passport. Red's Mystery Shack and Camp Sasquatch are both in the mainland wilds, in the region of Nagarjuna. Native Whispers is a new location in the Hopalong region of our home continent; a place for the indigenous peoples of the Americas and their friends. Mt. Campion National Forest is another natural location to explore. Finally, in the Fairhaven Redux region, the original builders have made a new version or Fairhaven; an adult beach and music venue with a tropical jungle and "photo opportunities at every turn".

All the information you need, including previews of the stamps you can obtain, are below. As usual, the new locations have also been added to the Online Travel Guide. Enjoy your visits and please do tell all you friends about the Bellisseria Passport. Everything they need to know is in the side-bar to the Gazette and our helpful staff of volunteers (our application process is very hands-on and personal) are always ready to answer any questions applicants may have. 

Red's Mystery Shack
Camp Sasquatch
Native Whispers
Mt. Campion National Forest
Fairhaven

Bus and Plane Tours | Change in Categories | Survey Results | Three new locations

BUS AND PLANE TOURS ARE NOW AVAILALBLE

Ever wonder if an immersive multi-stop tour is available to not only collect multiple BBB Passport Stamps, but to also see the way in which numerous stamps are connected via the numerous Linden Department of Public Works (LDPW) roadways, coastal waters or airway flight paths?  Well, wonder no longer!

  We will begin with the flight tours being offered since they were the first tour type to be developed.  Gemini Ravenwood (paganshadow resident,) a virtual airline pilot and member of the BBB users group, has created two multi-continent mainland BBB Stamp tours.

Tour 1 traverses the Nautilus and Satori continents, begins at White Star Airport, and allows the collection of six stamps upon completion at The Dirty Oar.

Tour 2 travels across the continents of Sansara, Bellisseria and Jeogeot, affording passenger to collect six completely different stamps.

Active in many mainland travel tours, Yukiko Yeshto has created an overland route via vintage bus, primarily in the Bellisseria continent, but, once again, two tours available to collect 11 other completely seperate stamps.

The tours are currently running, but are still in development as new stamps are introduced.  As of this printing they happen on Thursdays at 11am SLT, with the Bus and Plane tours alternating weeks, and the individual tours for each travel method also alternating.

Even if you have collected the stamps being offered, it makes for a really delightful couple of hour of exploration and travel around Second Life, not to mention the opportunities for new friendships as the groups embark on their tours.

There are also plans to have a Second Life RailRoad (SLRR) tour as stamp destinations along the routes are discovered.

Article by Cranston Yordstorm

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CHANGE IN LOCATION CATEGORIES

As we now have more than one railway station in our stamp locations, the BBB Management Directorate has decided to rename Category 1 in the Online Travel Guide to "Airports / Ports / Railway Stations". The Zany Zen Railway has therefore been moved from Category 5, "Other", to Category 1. This week's new railway station – details under New Locations below – has also been added to Category 1.

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SURVEY RESULTS

Thank you to all who completed our customer satisfaction survey, which is now closed. 

We are pleased to report that 79% of respondents would recommend us to a friend vs 5% who wouldn’t.

92.5% considered our services to be of very high or high quality.

85% said we were responsive or very responsive to questions or concerns.  

The most common way of finding out about our services was from friends or the Bellisseria Citizens Group chat.

We really appreciate the respondents who used the “any other comments” question to thank and praise us. We are volunteers and the occasional kind word is our only reward. Thanks.

If we were to be ashamed about anything in the results, it’s that only one respondent complained about our rudeness! We apologise to fellow bureaucrats  everywhere for this betrayal of the profession's traditions. We promise we will try to do worse better. 

Thanks again for taking the time to let us know your views. In all seriousness we are here to make your Second Life® more fun and we are glad so many of you enjoy what we do.

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NEW LOCATIONS 

This week we have three new locations where you can get your passport stamped. They include an impressive hydro-electric power station  – providing energy to Heterocera, as its land info proudly states. There's also a party house and a huge railway station – home of the Virtual Railways Consortium. All the details you need are below. 

Party House and Gym
Virtual Railway Consortium
Swiftwater Valley

 

A Day in the Life: Zoe | Bellisseria's Water Taxi | Three new locations

9/11 ANNIVERSARY

As our friends in the USA and 90 countries that lost citizens in the attack remember that sad day 20 years ago, our hearts and minds are with the victims, their friends, families and everyone affected by their loss.

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A DAY IN THE LIFE: ZOE

I rode my motorbike to the office; enjoying Bellisseria's beautiful scenery along the way. It's lucky there were not too many people on the roads, as I'd overslept and missed my morning coffee! People who know me will tell you I tend to get a little grumpy without my FIRST COFFEE .....!!

Arriving at our Winters Elm office, I noticed BBB chief Boo wasn't around yet. Lucky me! I could relax a bit while I woke up properly. I made a beeline for our coffee machine and, while enjoying my first sip, walked onto our peaceful patio. What a way to start a new work day, listening to the birds sing as I looked out over the river!

My first job was to empty the passport, drivers license and license plate mailboxes. Seeing the number of applications, I knew I would not be bored today! When the new applications were arranged in no particular order (I am a real bureaucrat!), it was time for my daily house-calls to verify addresses. Only genuine applicants – not mainland refugees – qualify!

I enjoy this part of the job as I get to see so many pretty places. Often I return later to explore them more in my spare time, which starts at 3.30pm (I am a real bureaucrat!). I like checking out applicants' homes through the windows. How nicely decorated many of them are!

Some are committed to their privacy, which I usually discover too late because I was busy admiring their beautiful things. After getting my umpteenth free flight from a security device, I wipe the dirt off my clothes and head back.

Luckily today I didn't have to ask the border police for help. All the applicants were genuine. Having checked their homes, we still needed to check their ID though. It's my job to make sure each gets a personal invitation to our Initiation Office for a full body scan. After sending those out it was time for my lunch break. So much work done already!

Lunch has become more pleasant since Mr Beeb was sent on indefinite leave. I relaxed in our lovely garden with food and a glass of wine (don't tell Boo). I almost forgot it was a working day.

After lunch, I checked how many citizens had visited the Initiation Office in the last two days. Too many alas – more work for me. So it was time to take the bull by the horns and actually make the passports, licenses and plates they'd successfully applied for. I had to make them all within 48 hours – such a hard life.

It's a fiddly job, which requires full concentration to process them faultlessly. Any mistakes in personal information would render the document illegal with all the consequences of that*. I looked at the clock, which showed 3:15 pm and decided to call it a day. The new documents had to be packaged and sent to all those Belli addresses, but luckily the post office is right next door!

I didn't complete all the documents; my day was shorter than the work required. Good bureaucrat that I am, I happily postponed the rest. When I see the boss I will make my routine complaint about overwork and say I really do need an assistant to drink wine with share all those house-calls.

*None at all – it's all for fun. 

Article and photo by Zoe Suki

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BELLISSERIA'S WATER TAXI

Did you know that Bellesseria has it’s own Water Taxi? It runs between the Fairgrounds (in Whiskey Bay), the Lighthouse (in Cedarburg), and a lovely trad community at Squishy Squid. You can catch the Taxi at the pier at any of these three locations. It arrives roughly every 10 minutes. Look for a sign that looks like this.

I caught the Water Taxi starting at the lighthouse. It is such a pretty location and well worth looking around before you board the taxi.

It took me to Squishy Squid where I got off for a delightful little walk around this lovely community.

Then I hopped back on it and rode it to the Fairgrounds, located in Whiskey Bay.

The fairgrounds is a great place to visit, by the way. It often has interesting events going on. At the moment, there were no special events, so I hopped back on the Water Taxi and returned to the lighthouse from where I had started my adventure.

Article and photos by Teresa Firelight

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NEW LOCATIONS

This week we have a cave system, the headquarters of Bellisseria's largest and most influential group and an arty coffee shop to add to the destinations in the BBB Online Travel Guide where you can collect stamps for your Bellisseria Passport.

The cave system is beneath one of SL's many versions of Stonehenge; on Campbell Coast. The BBB's very own Cranston Yordstorm took a break from his work for us to do some spelunking beneath his land. He discovered that Glastonbelli has its own distinctive cheddar cheese – made and stored for maturation in the caves he discovered. You don't need to spelunk, because he's built a railway you can ride to tour the caves. You may even meet SL's version of Cheddar Man, the oldest known inhabitant of the British Isles who met a violent death in the Cheddar Gorge some 10,000 years ago. SL's version is just as dead but rather livelier, so be warned!

Bellisseria Citizens is the largest and most active of Bellisseria's many groups. Its HQ is a great information resource for Bellisserians old and new – as well as being a relaxed hangout and a place to play games. At some point all or most Bellisserians are going to find their way there and now they can get their passport stamped too. 

Our editor, Fenella is curator of the Limoncello Art Gallery, which has a few locations in Bellisseria and on mainland SL. The latest of these is a cafe in the Elven Falls Art Collective, which opened in July this year and is a growing community of SL Artists. 

All the information you need is below and the Online Travel Guide has also been updated. Enjoy your SL travels and be careful not to lose your passport!

The GlastonBelli Cheddar Man Caves
Bellisseria Citizens Headquarters
Limoncello Gallery Elven Falls

GlastonBelli is back | Two new members of BBB Staff | Five new locations

GLASTONBELLI IS BACK

Have you been wondering where the GlastonBelli Pyramid Stage has gone?  Fear not, gentle reader.  It has merely moved to a new location and is now open for you to get that elusive BBB stamp!

In writing about its return, I wanted to get the history right, so I spoke to the people who created it, Bjoyful and Doc Rast. Doc saw a documentary about the Glastonbury Festival in Somerset UK, which had its 50th anniversary in 2020, and was inspired to create an SL build of the iconic Pyramid Stage.

It was used for a successful live music concert at the Bellisseria Fairgrounds in February 2020. Hence its SL name (Glastonbury in Bellisseria = GlastonBelli, get it?) That was followed by another concert festival in June 2020.

So this isn't the first time that GlastonBelli has moved.  From the Fairgrounds, it went to the Sunstream region on Campbell Coast in mainland Corsica. Due to design changes and the need for more space, it then moved to its previous location in the Erazor region. There it shared space with the Campbell Coast Artist's Village and Aerodrome. Now it's on formerly abandoned land in the nearby region of Sevenfold, landscaped in the fine Campbell Coast signature style of architect/designer Kitten Mills.

The new GlastonBelli Pyramid nestles in the midst of a lush redwood and pine forest, with a mountain overlook featuring a replica of Stonehenge. That ancient monument is part of the traditions of the RL festival as concert-goers often begin their pilgrimage to Glastonbury (or Glasto as the regulars call it) from there. There are hopes that GlastonBelli will again host music concerts in SL.

Article and images by Cranston Yordstorm. Online Travel Guide image by Fenella Allen

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PLEASE WELCOME NEW STAFF

Mulder (alex.alas) has joined the secretariat as Design &Distribution Assistant to Sun. He will help her in making stamps, distributing terminals and checking locations etc. Our other new staff member, Teresa Firelight, will initially assist Coal in the development of a secret special project currently in development. Please join us in welcoming them both.

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FIVE NEW STAMP LOCATIONS  

The number of places in Second Life where you can have your passport stamped continues to increase. This week, we have three more in the airports and ports category of the Online Travel Guide and two in the other category. The others  in this case are private residences in Fantasseria; our first locations on Bellisseria's fantasy sub-continent.

Unicorn Cottage
Wyrmsreach
Paradise Airfield & Marina
Port Friendship
Cape Blanco