It dawned on me today that the Instagram post I put out on what would have been by dad’s birthday was something I wanted to save for posterity. As this day is the anniversary of his passing and this blog is like my diary, specifically related to travel it felt natural to add it here.
We saved a lot of my dad’s old stuff when he passed, all sorts of knick knacks, just like granddad used to have back in the day… letter openers, compasses(!), business cards and pens for everywhere he’d travelled… Amongst it all I found these small, plastic bags full of coins. Coins from all over the world (he travelled a lot for work), and we never really did anything with these.
We didn’t throw them out, but they just stayed in the bags for years and years. Until I got the bright idea before my round the world trip to Google these currencies and see if they were still usable. There were pounds, yuan, pesetas, francs… all of them obsolete and useless… until I found a bag with Japanese Yen. They still looked valid from what I could tell so I stuffed them in my bag waiting to use them once I got to Japan.
“Basically, over 20 years after he passed away my father helped sponsor his little girl’s dream trip around the world. I like to think he would’ve like that.”
There were about £25-30 worth of yen in that bag and they were all spent on food and squid-on-a-stick in food stalls in Tokyo, Kyoto and Fukuoka. In a country my father visited several times in his own lifetime.
Fukuoka
Fukuoka
Kyoto
Kyoto
Kyoto
Kyoto
Tokyo
I remember he brought me and my mother a kimono each after he returned from one of his travels. I still have that little, black kimono. Child size, but I am of course completely unable to part with it ❤
Basically, over 20 years after he passed away my father helped sponsor his little girl’s dream trip around the world. I like to think he would’ve like that.
I miss you ❤
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