I love flags.   I have a collection of maybe 30 or so which I have gathered over the years ranging from a small all cotton one (12 x 18 inch) of the Town of Aalsmeer, The Netherlands (red, black and green horizontal stripes) where I worked in the flower auction in 1986 to a big Sweden (3 by 6 foot) which is made from the stuff that sails are made of and which has made it through thunder and lightning storms with 100 km plus winds. [Tip to people with new metal flag poles - don't rush out to take down the flag during periods of  lightning.

I have three criteria for buying:

• like Aalsmeer, I bought it someplace I visited,
• it relates to a relative, like Sweden or
• it just must be goofy.

So I was greatly pleased to come across this flag for Tanganyika (1919-1964) at what must be the best flag site on the internet. 

Flags do so many things well, I imagine if I ever become fantastically wealthy, they would become a subject of one of the public service announcement ads I would pay to run on TV during Super Bowl half-time.   The are bright, they are like kites, the best are still reasonably cheap and they can teach about history, geography, politics as well as tolerance.   One lawyer in my former firm had a USSR Soviet  naval lighthouse service flag - red, hammer and sickle and a nice little cartoony lighthouse in the fly...he kept it up on the wall in his office to test the tolerance of his fellow partners in corporate.