El Dinero de Costa Rica

¡Hola amigos!

El dinero de Costa Rica es muy diferente. Tiene muchos colores diferentes, y también hay personas famosas y animales especiales. Vamos a hablar más del dinero en inglés. Mira:

The bills in Costa Rica are not all the same size. Instead, the bill worth the most money is the longest, and each one down the line that is worth less is a bit shorter. If you were blind, you could still easily figure out how to pay for something at the store by feeling the bills — something that we can't do in the United States. My first picture is missing one of the bills, but I added it below. It belongs between the red and yellow bills in order:

The currency in Costa Rica is called the colón, which is named for the famous explorer Cristóbal Colón (in English, Christopher Columbus). A single colón isn't worth very much money, so the bills are quite large. Here's what each is worth:

anaranjado: 20,000 (veinte mil)

verde: 10,000 (diez mil)

amarillo: 5,000 (cinco mil)

azul: 2,000 (dos mil)

rojo: 1,000 (mil)

It takes about 500 colones to equal $1 of US money. Now that you know that, can you do some matemáticas to figure out how much each bill in the photo is worth in U.S. dollars? (The answers will be at the bottom in small print for you to check your thinking.)

As you can already tell, the money in Costa Rica is very colorful. The backs are more interesting than the fronts, though, because they each have a picture of a different animal native to Costa Rica:

20 mil: el colibrí (hummingbird)

10 mil: el perezoso (sloth)

5 mil: el mono (monkey)

2 mil: el tiburón (shark)

1 mil: el venado (deer)

There are also six different coins in Costa Rica, which are worth less than the paper bills:

These coins are also different sizes--the bigger the coin, the more it's worth. The smallest is worth 5 colones, and from there it goes up to 10, 25, 50, 100, and 500. The front of the coins mostly just have the number, while the backs are all the same:

Do you recognize this symbol? It is sometimes also on Costa Rica's flag.

Remembering that it takes 500 colones to equal $1, can you figure out how much each coin is worth in U.S. dollars (or cents)?

Bonus question: If I had one of each bill and one of each coin from Costa Rica, how many colones would I have? How much would it be worth in U.S. dollars? Post your guesses in the comments, and I'll check back in a few days to see if anyone gets it right!

Answers: 

20,000 = $40

10,000 = $20

5,000 = $10

2,000 = $4

1,000 = $2

500 = $1

100 = 20 cents

50 = 10 cents

25 = 5 cents

10 = 2 cents

5 = 1 cent

You're on your own for the bonus question!