Never have I seen such high standards in money changing as in Surabaya, Indonesia.... and that's not a compliment - its a pain in the bee-hind! The bank is a 10 min walk from the hostel, so why did it take over an hour to change our USD to Indonsian rupiah? We thought we were prepared, we'd heard the stories on how Indonesians only accept US dollars in good condition, they must be under 5 years old and un-scuffed. So when we found the bank we thought it'd be a straight forward process.... the teller was friendly enough, but she didn't accept our crisp USD as they were slightly curved from being in the wallet - seriously!! Brand spanking new notes!! So we went to the money changer instead, who accepted the notes but gave us a lower rate as we didn't have any 50 or 100 dollar bills.. I've never known money changers to change their rate based on the size of note! She also inspected each note with a magnifying glass! Hence why it took so long.
Sounds crazy - I remember getting stuck with a slightly torn $50 bill while on a trip dancing in Russia (Irish dancing in a show as a teenager - I think without the explanation that sounds a little dodgy)...anyway it was like half of my spending money - so upsetting!!
ReplyDeleteGreat to hear you're seeing lots. Will keep living adventures vicariously through you while I try to remember why I didn't take a year out this year :)
X
I love Irish dancing in Russia! Sounds like the kind of film title one might stumble across if flicking tv channels at 3am on a school night!
ReplyDeleteHope the new job is going well. I'm worried i'll have forgotten how to do my job by the time we return..
i remember the dollar note scrutiny well.. we had a game of sneaking the worst bill into various bundles and seeing who could be the one to get it changed.
ReplyDeleteIt sounds as though you are having a really splendid time.