I'm a simple emigrant and I like euros

In my life, for a fairly long time I used only three currencies: rubles, Mexican pesos, and euros. The rubles seemed beautiful to me, but I couldn’t understand why they don’t always fit into wallets. The Mexican pesos also seemed nice to me, and they turned out to be waterproof! And then I moved to Germany, I realized that pesos are very similar in style to euro banknotes and I immediately fell in love with the 20 € banknote. Although psychologically it still feels odd to me that euros and rubles differ by an order of magnitude, and it’s still easier for me to spend 100 euros than 10,000 rubles. Every time I’m surprised again when I remember that the euro as a currency appeared in Germany only 23 years ago. Back then the euro displaced the German marks with an exchange rate of about one to two. A month before the official introduction, the German government released for sale more than 53 million euro starter sets. A starter set like the one in the photo: it contained euro coins of all denominations. In total it was 10.23 €, and you could buy it for 20 Deutsche Marks. That would have been easier and faster for residents to get used to the new currency in circulation. I asked a couple of friends about this starter pack. One friend said he remembers receiving such a pack and immediately went to the skating rink and bought himself a ticket to his first euros. And back then he also bought Pringles, apparently, for as little as one euro. Just so you understand, Pringles now cost two euros. Another person said she doesn’t remember the starter pack, but she recalls that euros initially seemed toy-like. And in her neighborhood there was a street pancake stand. So, at one moment the prices there changed: instead of the letters DM next to the price, the euro sign appeared right over the previous inscription. And as I already said, the rate was about one to two, meaning in one second the price of a pancake doubled. Not all promotions manage to achieve such a result. I recently visited the German Federal Bank and saw that they still have announcements at the entrance about exchanging German marks for euros, the rate still about two to one. By the way, in the summer I was at the Bundesbank’s Open Day and saw halls that ordinary people usually cannot enter. Let me know in the comments if you want to read about the interiors inside and see photos! #history #money