I’m going to blame this one on JD… Most military folks have some of this stuff squirrelled away, or stuck in a stray pocket of an old uniform…
Vietnam, plus script from there…
PI and Thailand…
Various European/Mediterranean…
And Scotland…
And about $500 of current currencies, plus a pile of ‘change’ which isn’t really change…
At least it’s all collected in one place now…
What’s the strangest ‘currency’ you’ve got stuffed somewhere???
I collect US counterfeit script.
I’ve got air-drop counterfeit from Vietnam and Laos, counterfeit/surrender on the other side script from Gulf War 1, Afghanistan afghanis and rubles during the era of USSR occupation and other less well known venues. It’s framed – and the frames are in boxes at the moment, waiting to be displaced once again at the hovel at the White Wolf Mine.
To make my collection they must be US generated counterfeit.
I’ve got a (ROK) one won piece here somewhere. Worth about a tenth of a cent.
I have a 100 dong note from Vietnam around here somewhere. You have some MPC in your collection? I wish I’d kept some. I recall that the Vietnamese preferred it to their own currency.
Somewhere around here I have some 1, 5, and 10 Yen coins leftover from a mid-sixties tour in Japan. All paper Yen and MPC were converted when I returned to the ZI.
I try to collect the basic unit of currency in both note and coin form from every country that I visit – then I frame them.
So, a dollar note and dollar coin from the USA, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Australia, New Dollar from Taiwan, plus rupiah from Indonesia, ringgit from Malaysia, dong from Vietnam, baht from Thailand, kyat from Burma/Myanmar, peso from Philippines, kina from Papua.
Reviewing that list, I was thinking maybe I should have added some European currencies, but maybe it’s too late to do the tourist thing at the Islamic invasion front lines.
Have a few German Marks from the 60’s that my Father in Law had. He went to Viet Nam but we found nothing from there. We did find some membership cards to bars in Cuba he got while in the Merchant Marine. Someplace in Havana. Interesting since he was ‘underage’ at that time lol. Thought they were pretty cool.
Russian Rubles from 1991 and Nigerian Niara
5 Deutsche Mark coin.
As for genuine currency, nothing very unusual. A few of the old (bigger than a 50 cent piece) U.S. dollar coins. A smattering of Canadian coins which just happen. The most unusual thing, not sure how or if it might count in this counting, is a little red dot of a thing: a WWII ration point.
I have a 10 Mark Imperial Reich Bank Note dated 1910.
These are the ones that just a few years later needed a wheelbarrow full to by a loaf of bread.
No, I’m not that old. I found it in an abandoned house back when I was a kid.
A handful of East German coins that the priest tossed onto the steps of a church in Munich with an expression of pure disgust on his face. Someone had put them in the poor box, and they weren’t even vaguely convertible. They feel like Monopoly™ money and I suspect they are plastic of some kind.
I picked them up and brought them home. That was 1994.
I have a handful of Tunisian dinar & millimes, along with drachma, francs, and a few others.
LL- You win… LOL I never thought about framing these, that’s a good idea, thanks!
Drang- Won, Yen, Lira and a few others in a pile of coins… sigh…
Jim- They REALLY wanted green!
Home- Those would be neat! We were supposed to turn ours in, but I think these were in a flight suit pocket I missed…
Sendarius- Another great idea, of course I didn’t think of that either… sigh
Randy- In those days you were ‘legal’ if you could throw the money up on the bar…LOL
PE- Oil bidness… 🙂
WSF- I ‘should’ have some DM, but can’t find them!
Orvan- That ration coupon is probably worth more than the dollars to a collector!
Roy- Ouch! 🙂
TxRed- Neat, and definitely different!
Rev- I can’t find the drachma, or Francs either… sigh
I have some old gasoline and tire ration coupons from WW II. Old real estate tax stamps (incl. a fractional cent?) from when you bought the physical stamps from county and pasted them on the reverse of the deed or mortgage note. Have to look at them again.
The best one is a set of pesetas that I really need to mount in a frame. One is Juan Carlos, DGR Espana (1979). The other reads “name” DG Caud. Espana (1974). Yes, Francisco Franco is still critically dead. I found that one in the change mix and just howled for about five minutes.
I have a bill from Algeria from the 40s.
Like an idiot, I spent it all.
PK- LOL, good ones
Mrs. C- Don’t think I’ve ever seen one!
Ed- I didn’t keep it by choice… FLight suits…
Ethiopian birr, both bill and coin.
Hubby stationed in Europe. Put it this way, I now buy wallets which are designed with two different bill sections: where we are and where we’re traveling. I think my personal best was 4 currencies in my wallet at one time.
East and West Marks and Pfennigs, Soviet Rubles and Kopecks, Polish Zloti, Tajik Somoni, Paraguayan Guarani, a few Bolivianos, Kuwaiti Dinari, Iraq (Saddam) Dinari, Iraq (2004) Dinari, AAFES change pogs, Burmese Kyat, Thai Bhat, Lao Kip, and a bunch of other stuff that fell out of the baggie into the memorial box of doom.
My AF time was 100% CONUS. I have no furrin currency.
Why do you have to go and blame it on me?! Lol…I have D Marks and pfennings, Turkish Lira, francs, pence, euro coin, and a few others I am sure I am forgetting.
J.D. Brown
I have a bunch of Iranian Rials I never spent while I was there in the very late 1970’s. The Shah and/or his father was watermarked into the paper, and the money was rather ornate.
And then I have some of the same bills, but from AFTER the revolution. The watermark area has been stamped over with very black ink, obliterating the watermark.