Page 38 - FWG_Issue 2_March_2022
P. 38

Humour































                                           FUNNY MONEY





                                                    B Y JAMES CLARKE


                ears  ago I began hoarding   Whitechapel Road at £60.  Those figures   same as Randburg – R26 000. (Sandtonians
                Monopoly money in my sock   were decided in the 1930s when Monopoly   won't like that one bit.)
                drawer – stealing a couple of   was invented.
         Yhundred every time I played. I                                       One thing hasn't changed: if you land in jail
         expected that by about 2020 Monopoly   Then, in the 1960s, came the South African   you still stay for three rolls of the dice which,
         money would be worth more than the rand.  version and that's when Eloff Street became   in real life, is about what copper cable thieves
                                            fixed for the next 40 years at R400 and   get these days.
         Everybody said I was stupid. Ha! I was   Durban's Musgrave Road at R60.
         nearly right.                                                         Who plays Monopoly?  To be sure, every
                                            You received R10 for winning a beauty   night, every weekend, thousands of South
         The 70 year-old game of Monopoly is   contest. R10! Even members of the Post   Africans are bent over their Monopoly boards
         about the only game that has not become   Office Pilferers Union, if they find an   pushing around a little silver boot or silver
         dangerous. You know how it is – even kite-  envelope with only R10 inside, put it back.   dog, battleship, car, top hat or flat iron. Every
         flying has become ultra-physical these days   They have their standards.  evening, there are people shaking the dice
         with kites powerful enough to enable a                                hoping and praying not to land on ‘Chance’
         man to make 30m leaps into the air. Thirty   Players collected R200 each time they   because they know the card reading "make
         metres! That's about the height from which   completed a circuit of the board – unless, of   general repairs to all your houses" is about to
         stockbrokers leap.                 course they picked up a card reading, "Go   come up and it now costs tens of thousands
                                            to jail, go directly to jail, do not pass ‘BEGIN’   of rands.
         I  have  hardly  played  Monopoly  since  my   and do not collect R200".
         first childhood but, until very recently,                             Until a few weeks ago ‘general repairs’ cost R40
         whenever I saw a board I was filled   But time has caught up with Monopoly.   a house. R40! The last time I made a general
         with nostalgia. One could still buy Eloff    In the new South African version you no   repair to my (real) house, when a cupboard
         Street for R400 and Bloemfontein Station   longer get R200 for going past  ‘Begin’ –   door wouldn't close, the 4kg hammer alone
         remained at R200.                  instead you pick up R20 000 ‘salary’.  cost more than that.

         Among parlour games, Monopoly was a   Eloff Street, unsurprisingly, is no longer   I was interested to read recently that
         faithful psychological landmark just as   worth R400. In fact, Eloff Street is no longer   Monopoly and Scrabble are still high among
         reassuring and timeless as the story of   on the board. It has been replaced by Clifton   the most popular board games worldwide.
         Chicken Licken and the Reader's Digest on   at R40 000. Musgrave Road, which used to   They’ll be a century old in just over 10 years.
         the toilet cistern.                be the cheapest real estate on the board,
                                            has been replaced by Westville at R6 000.   It brings to mind a cartoon I saw showing
         Some will remember how, in the original   I was surprised to see La Lucia among the   Santa Claus playing his reindeers at Scrabble.
         UK version, you could buy Mayfair (a posh   next cheapest (R12 000) while Soweto on   The reindeers were impatiently raising their
         London district) for £400 and the cheapest   the other side of the board is R22 000 along   eyes asking him why he was hesitating. The
         property on the board was London's   with Boksburg and Hillbrow. Sandton is the   word Santa had in front of him was ‘venison’!!


                                                 Fourways Gardens • 36 • March 2022
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