Lunch Money

when i got to zimbabwe, i had no money. well, i had cab money for the ride back to my apartment in brooklyn (and secret cash stashed in my bra) but that wasn't going to get me anywhere. i couldn't stop at the bureau de change to change my money cos the official exchange rate is 250:1 and the black market rate is way higher and can change every few days. anyhoo... there i was, basically penniless for a bit but i was not stressed cos my sister had bought my bus ticket from harare to gweru (where my family now lives) so i was all set.

"oh, i have to give you lunch money for when they stop during the trip. just in case you're hungry"

you start off with this big wad of bills and you end up with a few things and no more bills. but if you are working in hard (translate - foreign) currency then it doesn't hurt so much so those who can try to keep as much of their money as they can in foreign currency and exchange only what they need. and it's fine if you can do that but what happens if you earn local currency, get paid once a month and can't hold your money in forex?

oh and then if you are a dairy farmer (mom) and the government controls prices (and doesn't subsidise what it pays farmers for milk) in order to make milk more affordable for the people and you want to remain on the right side of principles, if not the law. you become this amazing entrepreneurial innovator that makes your daughter realise that she really does not have a snowball's chance in hell of measuring up to you. sigh...

so there i was with my excellent timing, arriving in zimbabwe during the easter break, just when the exchange rate really sucks because the demand for local currency is high and the country is full of travellers with foreign dollars (apparently that is the economics of supply and demand. i call it i should've gotten here a week earlier).

luckily for me, my sister hooked me up. and that, up above, was my lunch money - $35,000. (the exchange rate was 20,000:1 that day and i only spent $14,000 on a drink.) thank goodness i have a big handbag.