Page 26 - Dainfern Precinct_Issue2_2022
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HUMOUR w
FUNNY MONEY
BY JAMES CLARKE
ears ago I began hoarding Licken, and the Reader's Digest on version you no longer get R200 for
Monopoly money in my the toilet cistern. going past ‘Begin’ – instead you pick
sock drawer – stealing a up R20 000 ‘salary’.
Ycouple of hundred every Some will remember how, in the
time I played. I expected that by original UK version, you could buy Eloff Street, unsurprisingly, is no
about 2020 Monopoly money would Mayfair (a posh London district) for longer worth R400. In fact, Eloff
be worth more than the rand. £400 and the cheapest property Street is no longer on the board.
on the board was London's It has been replaced by Clifton at
Everybody said I was stupid. Ha! Whitechapel Road at £60. Those R40 000. Musgrave Road, which
I was nearly right. figures were decided in the 1930s used to be the cheapest real estate
when Monopoly was invented. on the board, has been replaced by
The 70 year-old game of Monopoly Westville at R6 000. I was surprised
is about the only game that has not Then, in the 1960s, came the South to see La Lucia among the next
become dangerous. You know how African version and that's when cheapest (R12 000) while Soweto
it is – even kite-flying has become Eloff Street became fixed for the on the other side of the board is
ultra-physical these days with kites next 40 years at R400 and Durban's R22 000, along with Boksburg and
powerful enough to enable a man Musgrave Road at R60. Hillbrow. Sandton is the same as
to make 30m leaps into the air. Randburg – R26 000. (Sandtonians
Thirty metres! That's about the You received R10 for winning a won't like that one bit.)
height from which stockbrokers beauty contest. R10! Even members
leap. of the Post Office Pilferers Union, One thing hasn't changed: if you
if they found an envelope with only land in jail you still stay for three
I have hardly played Monopoly since R10 inside, would put it back. They rolls of the dice which, in real life, is
my first childhood but, until very have their standards. about what copper cable thieves get
recently, whenever I saw a board I these days.
was filled with nostalgia. One could Players collected R200 each time
still buy Eloff Street for R400 and they completed a circuit of the board Who plays Monopoly? To be
Bloemfontein Station remained at – unless, of course they picked up a sure, every night, every weekend,
R200. card reading, "Go to jail, go directly thousands of South Africans are
to jail, do not pass ‘BEGIN’ and do bent over their Monopoly boards
Among parlour games, Monopoly not collect R200". pushing around a little silver boot or
was a faithful psychological silver dog, battleship, car, top hat
landmark just as reassuring and But time has caught up with or flat iron. Every evening, there
timeless as the story of Chicken Monopoly. In the new South African are people shaking the dice hoping
and praying not to land on ‘Chance’
because they know the card reading
"make general repairs to all your
houses" is about to come up and
it now costs tens of thousands of
rands.
Until a few weeks ago ‘general
repairs’ cost R40 a house. R40! The
last time I made a general repair to
my (real) house, when a cupboard
door wouldn't close, the 4kg hammer
alone cost more than that.
I was interested to read recently
that Monopoly and Scrabble are
still high among the most popular
board games worldwide. They’ll be a
century old in just over 10 years.
It brings to mind a cartoon I saw
showing Santa Claus playing his
reindeers at Scrabble. The reindeers
were impatiently rolling their eyes
asking him why he was hesitating.
The word Santa had in front of him
was ‘venison’!!
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