Pocket Change

I have a declaration...I am now completely comfortable with my pocketful of change. When we sat in a fish n chips shop shortly after we arrived in August checking out the different coins, I really wasn't sure I would reach that point. They are all different sizes that don't seem to jive with their counterpart in the US (except the penny) and there are so MANY of them. Plus you can't think in quarters...you have to think in fifths with the 20p coin. Fifths???...who thinks in fifths?

Going back to cash in general was very weird to us. We had strictly been using our Discover card back in Texas -- we put everything on it and paid it off at the end of each month. Everything was done with plastic for the past 5 years...if we ever had any cash on is it was a miracle. That really wasn't an option for us when we moved here -- we've found that it is quite difficult to get a credit card when you have no credit history within the country (funny how that works). Ben got a debit card with the bank account, but that is only in his name as an international student account so I don't have a card. So, we go to the ATM machine every Sunday to pull out a regular amount of cash as the grocery/household allowance for the week.

Another thing we discovered quite quickly is that you have to have change to live your everyday life in Durham. You need it for buses, small shops you may wander into, parking if you have a car, etc.

So, here I am now quite comfortable with the 8 regular coins -- 1 penny, 2p (pence), 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, 1 pound, 2 pounds -- rather than the 4 we have in the US. I can finally stand confidently in line at Tesco and count out my pocket change without feeling like I am taking too long and inconveniencing the people behind me in the queue. And the best part about it -- since there are 1 and 2 pound coins rather than bills -- is that you can pull a few coins out of your pocket and have near 10 pounds. You could never do that in America...I love it!

*** If you're curious, the above picture has all the coins in it...the 1p looks like the US penny, the monstrously big copper coin is the 2p, the smallest silver coin is the 5p, 10p is the large round silver one, 20p is the medium heptagonal silver one, 50p is the large heptagonal silver coin, the pound is the thick gold coin, and 2 pounds is the large silver and gold coin.