What's the real value of fen?

By Todd Balazovic (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-10-22 12:02

"Is that money?" A friend visiting from overseas recently asked, pointing to a pile of one jiao bills I had haphazardly discarded on my living room table the night before.

"Yes, that's money," I said.

"I mean, is it REAL money?" she said.

"Yes, that's REAL money." I responded again firmly, but as I spoke I couldn't help but think "well, kind of".

With China's rapidly expanding economy and slowly rising prices, those pesky one jiao bills are having a difficult time keeping up and keeping relevant.

Ask an expat 10 years ago what fen is and he will most likely be able to tell you. Now the fen, 10 of which equal a jiao, is almost unheard of. As meals and meters rise in cost, it wouldn't surprise me to see single jiao bills go the way of the fen.

While I understand the monetary value of the jiao, the problem is that they are difficult to spend.

The one jiao bill has become to Chinese people what Americans feel about the penny - a dated currency more at home in the bottom of a long forgotten junk drawer than in a wallet, a unit of currency that's more of a pain to spend than to let gather dust.

I have an entire desk drawer at home overflowing with one jiao bills and as much as I try to spend them, the pile keeps on accumulating.

I've tried filling my wallet with the little notes but sitting on a pocket bursting with bills all day left my legs numb and my finances unchanged.

I've returned to the United States and offloaded the bills to appreciative friends and family as cheap mementos from China, but that barely made a dent in the stash of cash filling my drawer.

I have gone as far as considering dedicating an entire day to spending only jiao. I chuckle at the image of a Fu wu yuan's (waiter/waitress) disgruntled expression should I try to pay for a 20-yuan meal with 200 single jiao notes.

That thought alone has made it difficult to rustle up the courage to do it.

If you try spending one jiao bills en masse you'll find yourself greeted by cashiers who look as though you've just told them they could stand to lose a few pounds. Bring in a bag of the bills to a bank and you get a similar reaction.

It's gotten to the point where local convenience stores have taken to giving the currency away. If I buy a bottle of water for 1.2 yuan at the convenience store across the street from my apartment and try to pay using two yuan they shoo my hand away, taking only one yuan and ignoring the 2 jiao owed.

Most shops I frequent don't even bother taking up space in the till with one jiao notes and instead just throw them on top of the register, distributing them freely to those in need.

Though there are some useful moments when the one jiao notes come in handy, like when paying two jiao to park your bike or buying single vegetables at the market, the space they occupy in a wallet already crowded with receipts (and occasionally money) makes it difficult to justify hauling them around.

Still in the tough economic times we are facing, pinching pennies, or in this case jiao, is always a wise idea. To misquote Benjamin Franklin "A jiao saved is a jiao earned."

And while it's easy to gripe about the inconvenience of lugging around the little notes, I often find myself gazing ruefully into my jiao-free wallet and thinking about my drawer at home when the cashier asks "Ni you ling qian ma?" (do you have any small change?)

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