No, it’s not an exotic new dish. The Vietnamese dong (₫) is the currency of Vietnam.
One of my favorite parts of travel planning is calculating my travel expenses and ordering foreign money in advance. Sure, I could use the ATM in the airport upon arrival (and sometimes do) but I love having the currency in hand early. I like to admire the feel of the strange paper and learn to understand the foreigin iconography. The story of a country can be read on it’s money.
“I may be called away, I’m expecting a delivery of foreign currency.”
How I love saying that! My credit union partners with TravelEx for foreign currency exchange. I order the amount I want on the computer and TravelEx debits my account and delivers the money to my door in any currency I choose. My Vietnamese dong arrived in denominations. 100.000₫, 200.000₫, and 500.000₫.
The first thing I noticed was how dong come in graduated sizes. The smaller the value, the shorter the paper, making it easy to thumb through a wallet for the right bills. How pragmatic! There is very little writing on the bills making them easy to understand. While the colors, background designs, and cut-out shapes change, the front of each note is essentially the same. Toward the right, the peaceful gaze of Ho Chi Minh looks at you with gentle wisdom. If you look closely, you can also see a small watermark of beloved Uncle Ho toward the left as well. Each dong clearly displays it’s numeric value and written value both front and back i.e. “Nam tram nghin dong” and “500.000”.
The back of each note tells a story.
The 100.000 ₫
The image is a beautiful gate and courtyard. A depiction of the Temple of Literature. This is a place of worship and learning. It tells of a culture that highly esteems learning. In Vietnam, education and literature are national values. Look very closely at the 100.000 Vietnamese dong, and you can make out a tiny man and woman looking over the low wall into the “Well of Heavenly Clarity.”
The 200.000 ₫
On the back of the 200.000 Vietnamese dong, you see the beautiful and mysterious Halong Bay. An enormous karst island with a cave at the waterline rises from the quiet water. Small clouds of mist caress the rock. A junk stretches her sails proudly at it’s base. If you look closely, you see two people in the boat. One is working the sails, the other is at the helm. Together they are navigating Halong’s mystical maze of water and rock.
The 500.000 ₫
The back of this note depicts a lovely country home. Built long and low, it has a thatched roof and what appears to be some sort of out-building beside it. Plenty of windows overlook perfectly manicured gardens. We seem to be in the back of the home. I don’t see the door. On the other side of the house, sugar palms and thick trees rise higher than the roof. It’s the ideal of a Vietnamese rural home; the perfection of cultivation and architecture in harmony with nature.
If you look, every nation tells it’s story in symbols and ideals on it’s money. What are some of the stories you have read in foreign currency? What stories do you see on your own country’s money?
Read ~ Write ~ Wander
~Angie