Érme bűvészet - Coin magic

Last weekend i found an interesting coin in my purse. I'm using that small vallet only in the canteen during weekdays, so i must have get it there with the change. It says United States on the tail side and has "1 dime" written on it. I found this strange as i thought the currency is dollar in the USA :D
I looked it up on wiki and now i understand why are they always using the nicknames for the coins in the films. Because that's what's written on them. Not 10 cents, 25 cents, 50 cents but 1 dime, quarter, half dollar, and no numbers. Crazy people.
Also it's interesting that the dime - 10 cents - is the same size and colour as the 5p here; and the nickel - 5 cents - is just slightly smaller and has the same colour as the 10p. I might add, the hungarian 5 forint and 10 forint are like copies of the british 5 and 10 pence. International coin-spiracy. Nothing can beat in weirdness the good old 50p though.


"Weird! What a shape! This is money?" (quote from Ron Weasley)


This dime was the most interesting (furthest from home) coin i found here in England so far; the others were an euro 1 cent, spanish one if i remember right, i picked it up from the pavement on High street; and two twenty pence pieces, one from Gibraltar and one from Guernsey. I've got these two from the canteen too; we have a lots of different people working there from around the world, some doesn't even know british money well, so it's not that surprising.
I collect the rarer 50p and 2 pounds pieces too, i have about 30 pounds worth of those in my jewellery box. Sometimes when i'm very short on change i use a couple of them and then spend weeks to try get them back.
Last year there was a big re-design on the coins and now the reverses make up the the royal shield - being a heraldry geek, i almost squeeked when saw the first puzzle-piece amongst the change and realized this will be one of the best puzzles i ever did. I checked every single piece of change i could get my paws on and took two months after having all the others to hunt down a 1p coin, the last missing piece, with the help of my cousin who got the bug from me and was also collecting them on his own. I like the old reverses too, so many historical references on them: Tudor arms, Prince of Wales arms, scottish thistle, royal lion, tudor rose, the full royal coat of arms and these are just the basic ones... the one and two pounds have at least a dozen variations each. I love living history :)

I also keep a hungarian 20 forint piece in my vallet, which has a stool iris on it ; and a 50 forint, with a saker falcon, in my jeans pocket. Coin magic ;)