And now for something completely different

Currency in Japan

So a noticible difference between the American and the Japanese Currency Manufacturing Bodies is that the Japanese make no Cents.

The exchange rate rougly translates to 100 yen to 1 dollar. Honestly from a practical perspective this kind of makes sense. It's simpler. Why have two systems of currency dollars and cents when a dollar is really only 100 cents. It's semantics of course, but Jessi an I have been coping fairly well with the difference. The main difficulty comes up when we see bigger numbers when talking about something in class. 100,000 yen does not immeadiatly translate in my brain. 100 yen is a dollar, 10,000 yen is 100 dollars. Etc Etc. Fortunately I'm not doing a huge amount of business in Japan. Though at one point I nearly withdrew 3,000 dollars worth of yen instead of 300 dollar worth of yen (Thank goodness for "Are you sure" statements.

The biggest problem I've encountered with the Japanese currency system though it with coins. In Japan they use dollar coins, which I find pretty bad. This isn't so much unique to Japan, because the Europeans have dollar coins, and even 2 dollar coins. However what I find most horrifying is the 5 dollar coin,
and I'll explain why in a moment.

People who know me, may have noticed that I tend to lose things. I tend to lose important things, with absolutely no recollection of where or when I may have lost them. They're in my hand one moment and the next they've disappeared into the aether. Reverse Kleptomania I think is a good term for it, and I firmly believe it's possible for me to misplace something that was tied to me.

That being said distilling money into small metal circles doesn't quite work for me. In America if I manage to dump the contents of my pocket into a car seat without noticing, I may lose a buck fifty at the maximum in coins. If I keep my coins in a purse, and I keep the purse filled with quarters, I could lose 5 dollars on a very good day for myself.

In Japan, however, every time I pull my camera from my pocket theres a chance I could lose 3 dollars in coins and not even notice. When I get my change back from buying something, it's very likely for me to drop a dollar on the counter and forget it. My change purse (I don't use one in America, but they are necessary in Japan) is worth about 20 dollars on a good day, and I can fit about 40 dollars into it. Can you imagine having 40 dollars in a purse that's not much bigger than a match box.

It can be conveniant, sure, and for most people it's probably a pretty cool idea. But for those of you who know me well enough, you wouldn't be suprised if I managed to lose 50 dollars worth of coins in my time here in Japan. There've been no problems yet, so I'll keep my fingers crossed and knock on wood that I can keep my marbles altother for the duration of this trip.