Coins

I've been dealing with a lot of coins lately. Let me explain.

Brian's 8th grade homeroom organized the Primolympics day as a class project. The primary school olympics involves tug -o-war, sand castle building, and various other challenges for the elementary  kids at the international school. Each of them had to pay 3 euros to participate. The money raised was to be donated to Nothing But Nets, a UN charity that provides mosquito nets treated with insecticide to people in sub-Saharan African countries. Because the mosquitoes that spread malaria only come out at night, the nets are very effective at saving lives. I think we learned about it from my cousin Karen via a Christmas gift. If you want to read more about it, check out the website .
The kids raised 540 euros from the Primolympics, which is enough for about 70 nets that cover up to 4 people each. Play tug-o-war and prevent malaria...pretty great, right?

The payment came, of course, in coins. I like that coins here are worth something. In the U.S., coins are sort of an afterthought. You stick them in your pocket or throw them in a coin cup to save for the occasional drive down the Illinois Tollway (ok maybe other people don't do that, but Brian and I do, or did). In the euro zone, coins are worth a lot. I have paid in coins for meals, for bakery items, for minor grocery store trips, and for beers. The one and two euro coins are big and heavy and have busted the coin pouch part of my wallet. It is currently covered in packing tape at the bottom.

Brian and I made the Nothing But Nets donation online with our credit card, with the intention to deposit the cash raised in our bank account. So one day I lugged this huge bag of coins to the bank and said in my little-kid level German, "I want to deposit these." I figured they'd have a big machine that would count it all up and I'd be done. The teller proceeded to tell me that it didn't work that way, I needed to put them in rolls first. Then she said something about another bank that would do that for me, or would cash it out for me... I wasn't sure. She sort of pointed toward this mythical coin-counting bank, but I was not able to find it. So I hauled my bag of coins back home and contemplated how many trips to the grocery store I could make with 540 euros in change and how mad the people in line behind me would get as I counted out each coin at the register.

As I do sometimes when I am perplexed by Germany, I emailed Phillippa, the lovely school secretary who knows everything. She called the bank to verify that I did need to roll the coins myself but found out that I could get the papers for coin-rolling there. When I headed to the bank the second time, I broke down and just talked to them in English, but I got my coin papers.

I am good at many things. Coin-rolling is not one of them. After I spilled the coins about twelve times, Brian made me watch a You Tube video of  6 year old boy tossing pennies into rolls any saying, "I don't know why people think rolling coins is so hard." Jerk.
My rolls were not as tight or as pretty as his, but I did manage to follow the little guy's instructions. Yesterday I deposited 340 in one and two euro coins. I have some more rolling to do. Maybe instead I will just take the rest of the change to the supermarket and see how patient the other customers really are. Maybe next year I should pull one of the first graders away from his sand castle and get him to roll some coins for me.