Friday, September 18, 2009

Let´s talk money

Hello everyone. I´ve been here for over a month now and I´m starting to get used to the money system here. I thought I´d do a blog about the money here.
The Currency:
For starters the currency here is in Guaraníes ( or PYG). The currency shares its name with the native South American Guarani people as well as the native Guarani language. Currently the exchange rate is about 4930 PYG/1 USD. To make things easier most people just round to 5mil per dollar. (Note that when I use mil it means thousand.)
Coins:
Coins come in denominations of 1, 5, 10, 50, 100, 500, and the newly released 1mil Gs. Although all of these are legal tender only the 100, 500, and 1 mil coins are used frequently due to inflation.
Banknotes:
Banknotes come in denominations of 1mil, 5mil, 10mil, 20mil, 50mil, and 100mil gs. Once again the 1 mil gs bill is falling out of use due to several factors. 1. the 1 mil gs. banknotes are aging and many are falling apart. 2. The recently issued 1 mil gs. coin is taking its place. 3. There are no plans for future production of 1 mil gs. banknotes.

Paraguay gets the majority of its banknotes from the British security company De La Rue. The paper used for banknotes is the same paper used for the British pound as well as the Iraqi dinar.All of the exchange students I´ve talked to agree that the money here feels light and flimsy compared to the money back home. Money here is not minted regularly as it is in many countries and bills start to deteriorate after a while. Prices here are very low for most things. For example at school the normal plate lunch costs 10mil (2 dollars) and a 500ml bottle of pop will run you 3mil (60 cents).

I hope you all enjoyed this bit of info about the money here. If you want to suggest something else you´d like to hear about leave a comment. :D

P.S. Happy talk like a pirate day tomorrow.

4 comments:

  1. Arrgh! Ye remembered, ye scurrvy dog!

    Man, I was reading this and I was like "5 million!?! Holy carp" but then I saw that, apparently, thousand = million in Paraguay. Man, they crazy.

    May you be touched by His Noodly Appendage on this holiest of days!

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  2. It´s because in spanish the word mil means 1000 (thousand) while the word millón means 1000000 (million)

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  3. hey phill you think that when you come home you could bring some money for my dad he likes that stuff

    sounds like your having a fun time and i wish i was there.

    U trilingual prirate you

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  4. you make a lot more sense than the site i was on when i was trying to figure all that out myself a while ago.. lol okay.. i have a question.. how much of a difference in price is there when it comes to buying clothing? or do you know?..

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