Can anyone spare a dime?
September 23rd, 2008
All my bags are packed, I’m ready to go…
I only had a tiny bit of running around to do today for my trip. I picked up some toothpaste, a new lens cap for my camera and a wad of US dollars. I was quite surprised to discover only a week ago that the official currency of East Timor is the US dollar. I imagine (and hope) that one day, when East Timor’s economy is stronger, they will get their own currency. And maybe they could make a bold independent statement by giving it a wacky name! There are some good wacky ones around the world. In Zambia people walk around with ngwees in their wallet. In Gambia they have bututs, in Guatemala it’s quetzals, while the Malawians hand over kwachas. Some other ones are just impossible to pronounce like the Ngultrum from Bhutan, the Lilangeni from Swaziland and the Ouguiya from Mauritania. The again, at least it’s not as bad as the poor folk in Costa Rica who have piles of colons (bad pun intended).
I’ll be blogging while I can on my trip through East Timor and Indonesia, so stay tuned for my travel updates (well, that’s if my kidnappers in East Timor have broadband connection).