Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Money


On the way to the Tisak, this morning, I was thinking about money. The coins pictured here in my hand bought me one newspaper. 6 kuna.
It goes without saying that everyone loves inspecting foreign money. In large part, the novelty holds our attention, but there's an important cultural element. What a people decide to print on its money says a lot. For example, I remember spending few minutes looking intently at some Canadian money...a bill, whose denomination I don't remember...but what I DO remember is that it read, "Women are persons." Oh my goodness....My husband and I had a good laugh about that one. He, a Croatian-Canadian, never really spent much time studying the money but it was entirely new to me, an American, so I looked at it with fresh eyes.
There are British Pounds with pictures of the Queen...American Dollars with pictures of the early presidents and thought leaders...Croatian Kuna feature images of their national patriarchs.
There used to be the Italian Lire, French Francs and Dutch Kruners....and so on....with pictures of their revolutions, revolutionaries and heros...or in the case of the Dutch Kroner, their sunflowers....but all of it, money with character and a national identity that speaks volumes about its people and history. Well, Europe has replaced it all with The Euro...and to that, I say...too bad.
Likewise, the modern Croatian Kuna...with just over a decade under its belt....will be a thing for the history books within the next few years with "ascension" into the EU.
Aw well....I'll save one of everything for the kids and grandkids.