Brian, that is so Gangsta

I received an honorarium for my series of lectures at SUSTech (a University in Shenzhen, China) earlier this Summer and they covered my air travel and living & accommodation costs during my month long visit. The reimbursement came in cash. Usually now reimbursements for my travel paid for by other institutions come by bank transfer (from Europe) or cheque (the US) but I have had some cash reimbursements in the past. The largest one previously was from the Weierstrass Institute in Berlin in the early 2000's. Similarly they reimbursed my travel and living costs for a visit. It was a great wad of Euros that made me feel unsafe walking around with. At least on that trip, I could use some of the wad up paying my hotel bill.

The cash from China was a more substantial pile. For the first time I had to look up the allowable limit of foreign currency you could bring into Canada (it is $10,000 so I was well under the limit after all). I brought it all home with me and managed to exchange about half of it privately to avoid the exchange fees and the other half I took into the Vancouver Bullion Exchange, which I have recommended in a previous post. It was really an impressive amount of cash in 100 yuan notes (about $20 CAN) and so I took a picture. When I showed it to a friend of mine, I got the response which became the post title.

I should say that I do not routinely keep any large amounts of cash at our apartment, so I am not a worthwhile target for theft.