canyonwalker (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
canyonwalker) wrote2024-04-30 09:25 pm
canyonwalker) wrote2024-04-30 09:25 pm
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Too Much of a Souvenir: NZ Money
We bought a few different souvenirs on our recent trip to New Zealand. There's one simple souvenir I always bring home: foreign money. As I explained when I brought home a few dollars from Australia, I've always been curious about various world currencies. A bit of money from a country I've visited is, for me, a nice little memento. I brought home more than just a few dollars from New Zealand, though.
New Zealand's a country that has not just dollar coins but also two dollar coins. You can see a small stack of each in the photo above (top left). Having higher denomination coins is nice because it means you can buy a modest lunch, or at least a midday snack, with pocket change— without being that person who rolls up to the register with a sack of coins and a grudge against the lowly paid cashiers of the world. I also got a 50 cent piece, two 20 cent coins, and two 10 cent coins.
Just the coins, totaling NZD 12.10, were already more than I meant to keep. It turned out I had stashed coins in two places so I came home with more than I meant. Then when I got home I found that $10 note still in my wallet. I mean, keeping that note is nice because it has the Maori name of New Zealand, Aotearoa, on it, but altogether this collection of $22.10 NZ, worth about $13.50 US (remember: NZ dollars are in kilometers), is more than I meant to keep.
New Zealand's a country that has not just dollar coins but also two dollar coins. You can see a small stack of each in the photo above (top left). Having higher denomination coins is nice because it means you can buy a modest lunch, or at least a midday snack, with pocket change— without being that person who rolls up to the register with a sack of coins and a grudge against the lowly paid cashiers of the world. I also got a 50 cent piece, two 20 cent coins, and two 10 cent coins.
Just the coins, totaling NZD 12.10, were already more than I meant to keep. It turned out I had stashed coins in two places so I came home with more than I meant. Then when I got home I found that $10 note still in my wallet. I mean, keeping that note is nice because it has the Maori name of New Zealand, Aotearoa, on it, but altogether this collection of $22.10 NZ, worth about $13.50 US (remember: NZ dollars are in kilometers), is more than I meant to keep.
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The most lopsided exchange rate I've dealt with in traveling is South Korea— and that's less than 1/10th what you dealt with. Ten years ago Korean Won (KRW) were around 1,000 to the USD. It was conceptually easy just to drop a everything after the last comma to understand prices. Though then the exchange rate surged to 1,400. That wasn't so much a problem as, "Woohoo! Everything's on sale!"
During that surge I withdrew a bunch of money from Korean ATMs... Not enough to be an F/X investor but enough for, say, 2 weeks of pocket money. My little arbitrage worked nicely as the exchange rate returned to 1000:1 within two months. Though I see in the last few years it has drifted back up to around 1400:1.