Based Cyprus lira

12 comments
  1. I miss when I could take £20 and it would be enough to put full tank of petrol, go somewhere and have a decent meal with a couple of beers. Now with €35 it’s half a tank and no food, or a decent meal but enough petrol for 100km.

  2. Miss the cypriot lira so much. You could buy a pizza or sausage pie at school with only £0.50 back in the day.

  3. I remember it was 1997 and my mum gave me 50cents and I lost it and was devastated cause with it I could buy from our local mpakaliko a juice, a chocolate and chewing gum. Today that would be 5 euros.

  4. I know the whole design philosophy of the Euro is neutrality, promoting a united European identity, etc. etc., that we already have member-state-special designs on the coins, and having different inconsistent designs would make counterfitting a lot easier; but I really would love some unique flavour on the cash as well.

    The whole fun of living in a culturally diverse place is actually getting to see the culture, y’know? Imagine if every time you received exchange you got to see different designs from Ireland, Poland, Spain, etc…, who’d complain? Also, it’s was always intriguing when the cashiers gave me coins from Cyprus when I was in Germany; imagine the surprise if they handed you Cypriot bills in your stay at a different eurozone country, lol.

  5. In the late 80s- 90s, 20cents got you a cold sandwich from the school cantina, 25c a warm one. Tyropites were 15c, keanita juices 10c, another juice that wasn’t 100% natural and came in a plastic cup was 5c. It all just came back from this post, lol.

    These were cents based on the Lira, mind you, so they were worth about 50% more than cents based on the euro.

    And before that, we had the Selinia! 50 cents were 10 Selinia and so on, still based on the Lira.

  6. As a kid i remember when my father used to give me 5 liras every friday night, i could buy 2 sandwiches with drinks and have spare money for some arcade machines.

  7. Just a reminder that what you describe is actually the value of money that specific period. Having the Lira today doesn’t mean that whatever value it had back in the 90s would be the same today. Inflation needs to be accounted as well as other factors.

    Having tools to control inflation and monetary policy are of course advantageous but being in a monetary union also has its benefits.

    There were a lot of incidents that would plummet the national currency. 2013, haircut, the political scandals etc. All these events would 100% affect Lira.

    This is to say we are much safer with the euro and the stability of being in the Eurozone.

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