BYTE MARKS
Coins nothing more than a novelty in Mongolia

By Burt Lum

MONGOLIA — Early summer is by far one of the best times of the year to visit Mongolia.

The frigid winters are long past, and Ulaanbaatar, the capitol city, is bustling.

There's fashion here, influenced more by European styles and Western hip-hop than anything Asian. Some call it post-Soviet chic. If it weren't for the old Russian-style buildings and huge central Sukhbaatar Square, you'd never believe Mongolia was associated with the Soviet Union 14 years ago.

As in any first-time visit to a foreign city, money exchange is the first order of business. Evidently, the money used in Mongolia is not one of the common currencies listed on the money exchange Web sites.

I found one, www.oanda.com/convert/classic, that gave a conversion from dollars to Tugrik (Tg).

In Mongolia, however, there seems to be quite a number of money-exchange businesses. Being somewhat skeptical I decided to go to one of the larger banks, the Trade and Development Bank, to do my exchange.

While converting my traveler's check, I noticed the teller handing me only paper money. My inquisitive mind took over, so I asked her what kinds of coins were used in Mongolia. She showed me the coins and exchanged 5-200 Tg for my 1000 Tg bill.

Later that day I tried paying for a session at an Internet cafÚ with those coins and got yelled at for trying to pawn them off to the merchant.

You might imagine my surprise as this all unfolds without the benefit of the English language.

I asked my contacts what the story was with the coins. The coins were legitimate bank issued, so why didn't businesses accept them? They simply said they're not used anymore. Back in the Soviet Union days, 4 Tg equaled one U.S. dollar. Today, one dollar is equal to about 1000 Tg. This makes 1Tg equal to 1/10 of a cent. My 200 Tg coin was equal to about 20 cents.

It's apparently gotten to the point where coins are an inconvenience. I don't blame them. No one here wants to carry around a sack full of coins worth a tenth of a cent. ;-)

Burt Lum is one click away at www.brouhaha.net.