Down Under, Day 4: Monopoly Money

One of things which I have picked up on over the years is how wildly unique currency can be, and not just because of the Treasury Department's big marketing pushes to get us to the US the dollar coins or collect all '50 states' quarters. Every country has a wildly different idea about how to mark and identify its bills of sale - even the Euro design will alter depending on what part of the continent you happen to be in.

I know it's slightly odd to even be discussing such things, but Australia might just have my favorite style of foreign money. Everything is bright and stylized, printed on a heavy, almost starched brand of paper and embraces the full spectrum of colors. I was a little disappointed there wasn't a bill made in jet black to complete ensemble. To wit: $5 - Pink, $10 - Blue, $20 - Orange, $50 - Yellow, $100 - Green. Laying them out together makes a line of Australian bills look like the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat:


Not also how (and the more I travel the more I see that this happens every country except the United States), size does matter - a $100 is considerably bigger than a measly $5, not only in what it can by but in the number of times you need to fold it over in order to fit comfortably in your wallet.

The question I keep coming back to is "Why?" To be perfectly honest, I think the system we have in the US is just about as perfect as it gets when it comes to organizing and prioritizing our money. Every bill the same size, every bill the same color - and as long as we're on that topic, we should all agree that green = money. Must we feel the need to use orange and fuschia bills? We save those hues for when we want to buy Park Place precisely because they are so comical and out of place.

Despite preferring my home country's stlye, I have to admit I like seeing all the various shades and sizes that other countries put on their bills, because if the standardized "presidential green" system that we have in the United States were everywhere, traveling abroad wouldn't be anywhere near as much fun. Saving a couple of oddly sized and colored bills to put in the travel memory book is part of the proof that you went somewhere new and experienced something different. Speaking of which, although this transmission is coming back into the blogosphere early on Sunday morning, it's already late into Sunday night in Melbourne - and the real work begins at 11:00 AM sharp tomorrow as the tennis gets under way - and once that happens, things will be very different for me as far as the schedule is concerned.

To be continued...