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Burger and fries for $21 in Czechia
Methinks the euro is headed for the mother of all dives. Why bother opening a factory in Prague when New York is cheaper?PRAGUE -- When I first moved here in 1991, I remember hiking with my girlfriend in the mountains in Slovakia. We had just finished a long climb and had stopped at a little isolated chalet for a bite to eat. "Pssst," I heard a man's voice from the side of the cabin. "Do you have any dollars you want to sell?" Those were the days. The dollar was so popular back then that there were literally guys in the woods looking to buy them. The official rate at the time was around 25 crowns to the dollar, but I think we bid that guy up to 30 or 40 -- the best currency trade I ever made. The mighty sure have fallen. Pity the poor American tourist these days who arrives in Prague with a wallet full of dollars and some outdated notions of how everyone loves the greenback. He's in for a shock. The dollar peaked at about 40 crowns five years ago and has been falling ever since. The drop accelerated this year as the dollar plunged below 20. Now it's trading just north of 18, and no one dares predict a bottom. Taxi drivers long ago stopped taking them. Shop clerks look at them like they've never seen a dollar before. I even think I detected a sneer by the girl at the exchange counter the other day as I waited for some friends to change money. Dollar holders can't seem to buy any respect. Some of my compatriots have weathered the storm by buying property or finding jobs paid in euros or crowns. Other dollar-earners rush with their weekly paycheck to fast convert it into a stable reserve currency -- like the Czech crown. I was lulled for a time by the dollar's strength -- remember those days not so long ago when the Fed actually intervened to support the euro? -- and was slow to adjust. This year I finally decided to buy an apartment and have been racing against the clock to cash out of dollars. Each day's delay seems to kick up the price by a couple thousand. Prague used to be known as a cheap destination, a Paris for the young post-Cold War generation. I still remember fondly all those travel articles about $2 meals and quarter glasses of beer. Beer is still relatively affordable at between $1-2 a glass, but the fun stops there. I wandered into a restaurant the other day for lunch and ordered a cheeseburger. It was a nice place, but nothing special. The bill came to $21, fries included. For the moment, I'm being prudent and hoping for the best. While no one expects the dowdy dollar to rebound any time soon, I'm praying that at least the currency finds a floor. In the meantime, I can console myself with one of those $2 glasses of beer. Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-11-23 |
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