National holidays - what's open and shut and why? A Singapore story.

Problem
I once took a holiday to a foreign city for a long weekend, hoping to visit a museum and a restaurant on my last day. Unfortunately, they both closed on Monday.

Singapore
In Singapore, on Tuesday 29th May 2018, I tried contacting people in Toastmasters. Nobody was answering. Why?

From the emails and chats with others I know that in the UK Monday was a bank holiday. America had Thanksgiving. Singapore has Vesak Day on Tuesday.

But surely there must be places which are open? What about other religions, such as church groups?

Answer
Finally, somebody texted me the answer. In Singapore, most Toastmasters clubs meet in Community Clubs. Two of the busiest are Braddell Heights Community Club near Serangoon MRT (train station) which has four clubs, Braddell Heights 1, Braddell Heights II, Braddell Heights Advanced, and Mandarin.

Cairnhill Community Club, almost adjacent to Newton MRT, has about eight clubs, a Mandarin speaking club, a bilingual Malay and English club, a French club, and several English speaking clubs including Cairnhill, Star Millenium Advanced, Filcom for the Filipinos keen to improve their English, and the Vietnamese club and IPA, the Indonesian Professional Association. I have been to the French Club, Francophone, and English speaking clubs.

You would think that like restaurants, Community Clubs would choose to open on National Holidays. Apparently not. Offices and public buildings are closed.

Community centres, although they have outdoor sports areas and open-sided indoor sports areas, are run by offices. Presumably, they also need cleaners to check the toilets every hour. So with those holding the keys to the room also on holiday with their families, the meeting rooms are locked and the clubs cannot meet.

Thanks to the person who enlightened me.

The moral is, don't wait until the holiday and try ringing around because you might get answerphones , recorded information, instructions to ring back after the holidays and phones not answered. When you see a holiday coming up, check in advance what will be open.

visitsingapore.com
singaporeair.com (Singapore Airlines)
https://www.ishopchangi.com
http://www.changiairport.com/en/shop-and-dine.html
http://www.goodwoodparkhotel.com/durian-fiesta-2018-,promotions_viewItem_1341-en.html

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Author, Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker.

British Banknotes: Are They Still Valid? Where do I change old money? Where are the Bank of England, and its Museum?

Bank of England museum. Photo by Adrian Pingstone in the Wikipedia article on the Bank of England Museum.

Problem
I've found an old £5 banknote in an old bag. British pound sterling.

How can you tell an old note?

Old and new Five pound notes - the back. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

The old five pounds and ten pounds paper notes have HM the queen's head on the front. She is wearing her tiara.

You will see a vertical (up and down, north-south) silver line as if somebody has sewn a fine ribbon, the width of a flattened staple or a flattened paperclip.
The back of the old Five pounds has a picture of Elizabeth Fry, 1780-1815.

The New Five Pounds Note
 When I looked carefully at the new note, I started to admire it. The design is much more complicated and interesting than you might at first think.
The front has H M The Queen, above a pattern of the number five. To her left is a detailed drawing of the bank of England. You might spot some shields.

The transparent section contains a gold picture of the Big Ben clock tower. Above is a silver crown. Below is a horizontal lozenge with the word five. But as you shift your head the five changes to pounds.

Overlapping the see-through section is another, showing the queen's face again.

On the back, Elizabeth Fry has been replaced by a picture of Winston Churchill, which moves us from the 1800s to the 1900s.

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, army officer, and writer, who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955. 

Under Churchill's head there is a quotation: I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat. His dates, the years only, are in teeny print up the side. Behind him is a tiny but detailed drawing of the houses of Parliament.

What a work of art! The five pound note really is worth five pounds, from the point of view of an artist.

Every time I look at it, I see something new. It's beautiful enough to frame. I'm tempted to ask for a nice crisp new five pound note from a bank - if I can find a bank. Then frame the note, and only get it out to use in an emergency.

What about the ten pounds?
The old Ten pounds shows Charles Darwin 1809-1882.
If you have some leftover notes from your last trip to England with these pictures on paper money, you can't spend them in shops nor change them at the post office.

Is it still valid? British banknotes say in small letters:

promise to pay the bearer on demand.

It is signed, in facsimile, by the Chief Cashier.

I shall have to go and demand some new notes.

But, why am I put to all this inconvenience? Why are they changing the money?

I suspected it was to cheat us out of our savings. First, they close down the banks. Then all the pensioners who don't use banks (because they can't manage computers and pin numbers) and keep their money under the pillow, or buried in the garden, find their life savings are worth nothing.

I went into Tesco, having forgotten all about it. But the sharp-eyed cashier hadn't forgotten. She wouldn't take the note. Luckily I had enough money to pay the bill.

Why are banknotes changing? Despite those little silver shiny lines in the old banknotes, they were still not good enough to prevent fake notes being printed.

The powers that be say it's because the fraudsters who print fake bank notes have got so sophisticated that better security has to be used.

Also the old paper money disintegrated, so new less destructible money is made. Presumably we won't be chucking our life savings in the bin, so the indestructible money won't end up in the stomachs of wildlife out in the ocean.

What does the new money look like? How do I know they have given me a valid new note?

The new notes are shiny like plastic. They have a see-through section which one presumes is harder to forge.

Some people save a note or two, in the hope that one day it will exceed the trade-in value at the Bank of England. If all those old notes are destroyed, to prevent people trying to con the unwitting into thinking they are still valid, then the rarity of the ones accidentally left out in old handbags and jacket pockets and found years later might one day be worth more.

If you were going to save one, you should have saved a nice clean one. Old notes get dirty and creased. Money is notorious for being passed from hand to hand and carrying germs. That's one reason for making the new, durable notes. Can you wipe them clean?

If inflation continues and rises, the new five pounds you get back will be worth less, buy you less, every year.

If you have the paper twenty pound note, in March 2018 it is still valid. The twenty pound note will be replaced, they say. So think about making sure that you trade them in when the time comes.

You have to go to the Bank Of England to change your old style money. If you are a tourist visiting the centre of London anyway, or a London-based UK pensioner with a free Freedom pass for free travel on public transport, you could combine your bank visit with another sightseeing experience.

The Bank of England has a museum. Free! No money needed.

What else is there to see nearby? There's The Monument, Guildhall, St Paul's Cathedral, The city, also called the Square mile. The Tower of London, Tower Bridge, technically in Tower Hamlets, are right alongside. The London Museum. Or just walk along The Thames photographing landmarks and plaques.

Where to change old money
Bank of England, Threadneedle Street,
London EC2R 8AH

Enquiries tel: +44 (0)20 3461.

Monday to Friday, but not weekends nor on bank holidays. Yes, the banks take holidays on bank holidays - that's why they are called bank holidays. When my family tried to return notes, the queue (line-up) was long and the bank of England closed at 4 pm.

Here are the official answers:
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes
The website also tells you about counterfeit notes.

BANK OF ENGLAND MUSEUM
Bartholemew Lane
London EC2R 8AH.

How do I remember the postcode - EC2 ar! 8 ah!
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/museum
https://www.visitlondon.com/things-to-do/place/611007-bank-of-england-museum

Wales has another in Llantrisant, South Wales, off the M4 in the direction of Cardiff:
It looks very interesting, with a car covered in coins. But it will cost you a lot of coins. £13.50 full price for adults, £11.50 for seniors and students with ID, £10.50 for children 5-15, and under fives free. You can buy tea there. They say allow 90 minutes for a visit. (I always take longer, what with reading every caption and browsing in the shop and stopping for tea. Unlike the Bank of England museum in London, the one in Wales is open at weekends. What do you get for your money? It does look a very big, busy, modern museum.
http://www.royalmintmuseum.org.uk/collection/index.html

Other collections are in national museums.

A roundup of money museums is here:
https://www.capitalgoldgroup.com/blog/numismatic-museums/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Numismatic_museums_in_the_United_Kingdom

Scotland has its own £1 Scottish pound note. The museum on the Mound in Edinburgh has a shop where you buy souvenirs sjch as key-rings and magnets containing shredded notes.
https://museumonthemound.com/gift-shop

TO VISIT ENGLAND AND THE UK
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Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. See my previous posts on The Guildhall and other sites in London and around the world. Please share links to your favourite posts.

Watch out for unexpected parking charges

Make it a rule to always read the nearest parking signs. Don't assume that it's free after six, or at weekends, or on a Sunday or on a Bank Holiday, or this side of the road, even if it was in another country, another city, or even here last week.

One friend of mine was caught out when her local council decided to make parking on alternating sides of the road on different days of the week. A relative of mine thought that it would be ok to park on a bank holiday.

I have on my phone a photo of the parking signs in Pinner.

One person I know always keeps small change specifically for parking meters. Now you can often se contactless payment. But sometimes the machine won't take your payment. It might also be worthwhile photographing where you left your car, and the time you left it or placed the parking payment on the windscreen.

Hoping to save you time, money and stress. Spend time on information, education and entertainment from my blog posts on travel, grammar and spelling.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, researcher, English teacher, speaker, author.