Start Your Travel Fund With The Change In Your Pocket (But Good Luck Finding A Bank To Count Your Coins)

by Dave Seminara on

Six gallon-size jugs of coins once bought me a one-way ticket to Cairo. It sounds ridiculous, I know, but I’ve long had a curious little ritual before leaving the country that I’m very fond of. I’m a coin accumulator. You know those people who take several minutes to scrounge around for pennies while you are waiting impatiently behind them in line? That’s not me. If my bill comes to $1.01, I give the cashier $2, even if I have the penny in my pocket.

Why? Almost twenty years ago, I read about this change accumulation tactic and decided it would be an effortless way to start a travel fund. It’s hard to save money but it’s easy to accumulate coins. At the time I started my first coin collection, I was stuck in an office job in Chicago that I loathed. It felt good to accumulate coins and then dump them in big jugs in my room when I got home.

It made me feel a bit like a prisoner trying to gradually chip his way out of Alcatraz through some loose molding. I was plotting my escape and the growing coin collection was a measure of my progress.

After about two years of saving, I was ready to quit my job and take off for a four-month overland trip from Cairo to Shanghai. I had about $8,000 in savings in the six aforementioned jugs of coins. When I lugged all the coins to a local bank their coin counting machine made these loud, gurgling noises that were music to my ears. I was astonished when the clerk told me I was due $436. It was thirty bucks more than I needed to book a one-way ticket to Cairo.

Since that epic trip, I’ve continued to accumulate coins, though at a much slower rate of late because I like to use my credit cards to accumulate frequent flyer miles. Still, I relish going out to trade in my coins right before an international trip. I bring the cash I get back with me and it feels like extra money that I can blow on whatever I want.

But over the years, it’s become harder and harder to find coin counting machines that don’t charge a commission. And the tellers greet you and your coins about as warmly as Mullah Omar might be received at a Ground Zero commemoration event.You can use the machine at your grocery store, but you’ll lose 9 percent — not a very good way to start a trip. Five years ago, prior to a trip to Newfoundland, I spent more than an hour lugging two huge, heavy jars of coins around downtown Washington, D.C., looking for a bank that would count my coins.

At least half dozen banks insisted that I roll the coins into paper sleeves — a task that would have taken hours — until I finally found a place that had a no-commission machine. But the most embarrassing part was walking through a park that was filled with homeless people begging. What do you say to a guy who asks for spare change when you’re carrying about $200 worth of it? Ummm, sorry, you see, I’m going to Newfoundland, and….

I gave away a bit but still felt cheap. But not as cheap as I felt today, as I was bounced around nearly every bank in my town and found none that would count my coins without a commission. I’m about to leave for Europe on Tuesday and I had a modest coin collection that I needed to dissolve — but how?

There are seven banks I pass on the way from my children’s preschool to my home. Burke & Herbert, BB & T, Sun Trust and Wells Fargo all had no machine.

“You should roll your coins,” said one annoying teller.

“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll take that suggestion under consideration” (perhaps when I’m retired or incapacitated).

Then I went into a second, larger BB & T branch and thought I’d hit pay dirt when I saw a coin machine in the corner. But alas, they have a 6% commission unless you open an account. I considered paying the commission but remembered that there were still two more banks I’d pass on my way home.

I struck out at Bank of America, where the teller looked at me and my bag of coins as though we were contagious, but then I saw something promising outside a bank I’d never heard of before across from a bakery with the preposterous name “Panaderia de Paris.”

T.D. Bank’s sign said, “America’s Most Convenient Bank.”

Surely the most convenient bank in the land of the free and the home of the brave would offer a commission-free coin counting machine, right?

“It’s 6% commission unless you open an account,” said the over-officious teller.

A sympathetic man in dreadlocks shook his head and chimed in.

“Man, that ain’t right!” he said. “Why does it cost money to count money?”

I was delighted to have found a like-minded soul and I immediately wanted to invite him to Europe. But instead I inquired about opening an account with an initial deposit of $1.

“You can open an account,” the teller said suspiciously. “But if it falls below the minimum balance of $100, then you’ll be assessed fees.”

“That’s OK,” I said. “You can take them out of my $1 and when it gets to zero you can just dissolve the account.”

“But you’ll be sent to a collection agent,” she said.

That didn’t sound very convenient, so I grudgingly shuffled over to the machine and hit the start button on the touch screen.

An animated image of a cute freckled little girl in bib overalls and pigtails appeared on my screen.

“My name is Penny Arcade!” she chirped. “I’m here to count your coins, are you ready?”

I dumped my coins down Penny’s machine and then the charming lass popped back up on the screen again.

“Do you want to guess how much money you’ve inserted?” she asked. “If you guess within $1.99 of the correct amount you’ll win a prize!”

I asked the teller if there was a fee for guessing.

“Oh no, that’s free,” she said, reassuringly.

I mostly use credit cards these days, and my coin collection is only about a year old, so I guessed $46. A slot-machine-like image popped up on the screen showing six digits with the numbers scrolling very fast, giving one the impression that, who knows, maybe you might win a jackpot. Now this was entertainment clearly worth at least a few bucks.

My depressing total was a paltry $32.44. Less the commission it came to $30.50 — perhaps enough for a meal in an inexpensive trattoria or perhaps a seat on Ryan Air. In an age of plastic and frequent flyer miles, clearly my best coin accumulating days are behind me. How sad.

After handing me the receipt the teller had one last pitch.

“Are you sure you don’t want to open an account?” she asked.

[Photos via Mukumbura, Mapless in Seattle and Jason Rogers on Flickr.]

Whole Foods To Ban Sale Of Unsustainable Seafood: The Global Impact

by Laurel Miller on

In a landmark move, Whole Foods has just announced that starting on April 22 — Earth Day — it will no longer sell seafood from depleted or otherwise unsustainable fisheries, or species harvested with ecologically damaging methods such as trawling. The industry ratings for these species are determined by the Blue Ocean Institute and California’s Monterey Bay Aquarium, which produces a popular “Seafood Watch Recommendations” pocket guide and phone app for shoppers. Say bye-bye to Atlantic halibut, skate, octopus and sole.

It’s a bold move for the world’s largest, most powerful green grocery chain to defer customer demand for better buying practices, but according to Whole Foods’ seafood quality standards coordinator Carrie Brownstein via an AP article, “In the long term, what we’re really looking to do is help reverse trends of overfishing and by-catch, so that really we can move the industry as a whole toward greater sustainability.”

So how does what you eat here at home have a global impact? Depletion of any fishery always has a negative effect on the food chain because of a ripple effect. Foreign fisheries may also employ unsound fishing methods that increase by-catch (think dolphins and other aquatic species, albatross, etc.). You may love Chilean sea bass (it’s actually Patagonian toothfish) but it has long been a fishery on the verge of collapse and by purchasing it at the store or ordering it at a restaurant, you create demand for that product. Once a species is extinct, it can seriously throw a marine ecosystem out of whack. Plus, you know, extinction kind of sucks.

It’s harder for world travelers to be on top of what’s sustainable and what’s not, especially if, like me, you love street food. In developing nations, especially countries with a coastline, fishing is usually a key part of the local economy. But saving our rapidly depleting oceans trumps putting a few pennies in local pockets: they’re not looking at the big picture, which is the more seafood we consume, the less there is to sell.

Order something besides seafood unless you’re positive it’s caught in a non-environmentally degrading way, from a healthy fishery. Go to the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch Recommendations site for a global guide to what’s sustainable and what’s not. It offers alternatives, so odds are, you can travel and have your lobster dinner, too.

[Photo credit: Flickr user Eneas]

Photo Of The Day: Spring Blossoms

by Alex Robertson Textor on

Spring blossoms are here.

More to the point, it is really starting to feel like spring across the Northern Hemisphere. (And in fact, unseasonably warm weather in many different spots around the world has had things feeling like summer several months ahead of schedule.) This image of tender spring blossoms, taken by Flickr user (flicts) in Barcarena, Portugal, really captures the tentative, giddy nature of early springtime. See more work by the photographer here.

Upload your super seasonal images to the Gadling Group Pool on Flickr. We choose our favorite images from the pool as Photos of the Day.

Wine: The New Drink Of Asia?

by Kyle Ellison on

No, there aren’t vineyards suddenly springing up along remote portions of the Great Wall, inside the DMZ or on the upper slopes of Mt. Fuji. Of that much I am certain. There are, however, many people who live in these areas who are developing a notable penchant for wine and, all of a sudden, the big name wine growers are starting to take notice.

A recent news release discusses that although European wine exporters have seen a decline in their traditional markets in North America and Europe, the expanding palates of Asia are proving to be a welcome change of direction.

Evidence? The article uses the example of a South Korean wine importer perusing the stalls of a massive wine expo in Verona, Italy, who admits that Italian food and Italian wines are becoming more favorable in South Korea.

Also, according to statistics cited in the article, there was a 10% increase in wine consumption in Asia in 2011 bringing it to 5.5 billion liters, whereas estimates run as high as the continent being able to quaff a record 6 billion liters for 2012.

Meanwhile, in China, Benjamin Chau, deputy head of the Hong Kong trade development council believes that as a growing number of Chinese markets prosper, so too do their imbibing habits change. Historically drawn to strong liquor, Chau argues that as quality of life improves for many Chinese citizens wine is becoming a fashionable and more health-conscious drink of choice, which is often imported from vineyards in the West.

So how much emphasis is being placed on Asia as an emerging wine market? Enough that new Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti was told to be peddling a list of “Made in Italy” products while on a recent visit to Japan, South Korea and China. Seeing as Italy was the world’s largest exporter of wine in 2011, I am sure multiple vintages and varietals were offered as part of the touring menu.

So is it time to trade in the sake for the syrah the next time you’re in Tokyo? Should we swap the soju for sauvignon blanc while nibbling on kim bap in Seoul?

I’m not sure if I would go that far, but if this is a trend that continues to gain steam, it may not make for a far-fetched future.

The First Floor Of The Stoa Of Attalos To Reopen In Athens

by Sean McLachlan on


Despite hard economic times in Greece, its capital city, Athens, is about to expand visitation to a major archaeological treasure — the Stoa of Attalos. This ancient Greek colonnade and indoor market was built in 150 B.C. by Attalos II, King of Pergamum, as a gift to Athens in gratitude for the happy schooldays he spent there.

The Stoa was meticulously reconstructed in the 1950s by The American School of Classical Studies at Athens, and houses the Museum of the Ancient Agora. While visitors have been able to visit the ground floor, the first floor has been off-limits for thirty years. It will reopen in mid-May, just in time for the start of the peak tourist season. The floor will house a display of Greek sculptures that have never been shown to the public. Windows will allow visitors to get a good view of the rest of the Agora, the ancient city’s social, spiritual and political hub.

Top photo courtesy Ken Russell Salvador. Bottom photo courtesy Tilemahos.