Penny for Your Thoughts?

     Being in a different country and all, the currency is obviously going to be a bit different. Well, I've found that I actually prefer the Australian money system better. Of course it's not the same because it looks different, which is one thing that I like about it, but it also has a different value system.

     For one, the notes here (they say notes, not bills) are much more colorful. Each value note has its own basic color, but within that there are also other colors. The ten dollar note, my favorite one, for example, is basically blue, but it also has yellows and greens in it. This gives a slightly Monopoly-ish, but very elegant look to the money. The sizes of notes change too. As the value of the note gets bigger and bigger, so does the size. This allows for easy organization. As well as the color and size differences, on each note there is a man on one side and a women on the other (excluding the five dollar note). I like this partly because it's a little less sexist, but mostly just because it's different.

     I have yet to come across a note that has been ripped and it's not because they take them out of circulation. It's because you can't rip them! I've tried and tried and it does not work. You can somewhat deform the part of the note that you attempt to rip, but that is about the most successful you will get without the use of scissors. No, I didn't cut my money in half!

     Do you remember all of those cool tricks you could do with American one dollar bills? Well you can't do them here because they don't have one dollar notes! They don't have one cent pieces either. Their lowest note and coin are both a value of five. I quite like this actually because you don't have to deal with those useless pennies that you have no idea what to do with. The only problem that you'd think of is that this lack of one cents would make things a trifle difficult when buying something that's not an even multiple of five. But, they've come up with a very simple solution to this: rounding. If something costs $5.43 then it just rounds up to $5.45 and it would also conveniently rounds down if it were $5.42. They do have one dollar and two dollar coins, which I was a bit apprehensive about at first because I was worried that I would lose them, but I've gotten used to it. To distinguish the dollar coins from the lesser ones they made the dollar coins gold and the smaller coins silver. The only thing that I don't understand is why the two dollar coin is smaller than the one dollar coin. Does that make sense to you?

     So, the value amounts of coins are 5, 10, 20, 50, $1, and $2. Each of them usually has an animal on its back. There is everything from an echidna, to a platypus, to the famous kangaroo. I think that's what really won me over.

     If I had the choice between American currency and Australian, I'd have to go with the Aussies on this one. The only downfall: it's worth less.