This blog entry is ongoing work
Colombian money is confusing even for Colombians due to a relatively recent change of the bills.
First lets start with punctuation
We use a comma for cents. eg. Fifty cents = ,50 (we no longer use cents, but is good to know)
We use a dot for thousands. eg. One thousand = 1.000
We use an apostrophe for millions. eg. One million = 1'000.000
Keep in mind that this article is not historically accurate, I'll talk about the people or things in the coins and bills on a very superficial level
Coins
Coin are used a lot on daily life, we currently have 2 sets of 50, 100, 200, 500 coins and one set of the 1.000 pesos coin
Denomination | Comment | Old | New | Picture |
50 | This is the coin you give as change when you hate someone and you want to screw them over, the only reason this exist is to annoy businesses. | SIlver looking coin with a Colombian coat of arms and a big "50" on the other side | Has an animal that look like a polar bear, but is in fact spectacled bear. | |
100 | ||||
200 | ||||
500 | ||||
1.000 | If you find an old one, keep it. it however doesn't have any value nowadays, government phased it out because it was too easy to counterfit. | This is our most good looking coin |
Bills
Denomination | Comment | Old | New | Picture |
1.000 | Grossest bill you will ever lay hands on since is the most used bill for day to day operations. | Collectors item | it features a guy whose murder incited one of the most violent times in Bogota | |
2.000 | ||||
5.000 | ||||
10.000 | This one features the most badass Colombian woman, her name was Policarpa and she was a spy who died by firing squad while cursing the Spanish | |||
20.000 | ||||
50.000 | ||||
100.000 | SInce the 3 years these have been in circulation i've only seen them 3 times, having one of these is like having a check, nobody will accept them, so make sure that if you are unlucky to get one you get rid of it as soon as possible | N/A |
This bill features Gabriel Marquez, our Literature Nobel price winner, everyone knows who he is, but less than 10% of the population in Colombia have read his novels. |