After a short wait in line at my local Citibank branch, I was able to count my crisp new Hong Kong dollar bills. They are so colorful and vibrant in their new state. Why is the US dollar not so colorful? Why must we have such boring money? “The greenback” as they say is the international currency. Why must it be so monotone? One of the HKDs has a plastic window in it. How cool!
The main concern of mine is how do I know if something is fake or not. Vendors may give me back fake money and then I am SOL or the rest of the trip. I know people take travelers checks, which is all well and good, but we have a… get this…. Capital One card. They do not charge the 3% conversion fee each time that I make a purchase. That is great for us because the USD is not the currency it once was. It has depreciated in value during the recession. I just hope things don’t get worse while we are there. The HKD is currently worth $0.12 USD. So 100 HKD is about $13.00. Is there anything in Hong Kong that you might want? Let us know and we can put it on a small list of souvenirs to bring back state-side.
