I've collected fares in the Sepik in Japanese occupation money
Talair was kept busy flying hundreds of locals with biscuit tins from the outstations into Wau around Independence time. These tins had been buried for years under the dirt floors of their huts. We were expecting lot of people wanting to change dollars and cents into kina and toea - but the tins were full of old Australian Pounds, Shillings and Pence - and quite a few bundles of Japanese occupation money.
All of it smelt of smoke and the smell lingered for weeks.
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