I think this news in Sin Chew is related to the upcoming Chinese New Year. Just want to share and wish everyone double joy this year. Many of us are going after money and there is no exception for Mrs Luo. Nevertheless Luo is going after ancient coins which have lost their face value today but are still of tremendous collection values. Luo has in her collection more than 200 antique coins, many of which are from this country. Her collection covers coins all the way from the British colonial days to the post-independent Malaya and the formation of Malaysia.
Apart from that, her collection also includes coins from Thailand, Indonesia, Brunei, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, India, the United States, Britain and other countries. These old coins are found in varying sizes, values and shapes, and Luo has arranged them neatly based on their countries of origin. Among the multitude of ancient coins, the oldest one in Luo's collection could be traced back to the Qing Dynasty in 1891.
Coincidentally, Luo's husband has a passion for collecting old banknotes. When the couple were married, they had even formed the Chinese character "Xi" (double happiness) with Malaysian 5 cent coins. Luo said she started collecting coins when she was in the primary school. During the 1950’s, 5 cents could buy a bowl of noodle or bread, and a bowl of noodle with extra ingredients was sold at only 10 cents.
She recalled that she could buy a bowl of noodle and a glass of water with her 20-cent daily pocket money, adding that her parents only received a monthly salary of less than a hundred ringgit back in those years. She said even though she was still very young at that time, she started to develop an interest in coin collecting, and often exchanged coins from different countries with her classmates. She said the only difference between old and modern coins was the "heavier" clanking sound of old coins when falling on the floor compared to modern ones.
Source: My Sin Chew
