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South Africa’s currency, the Rand, is very liquid on international markets. Sometimes a little too much so for our tastes, to be honest. On occasion we have such vast fluctuations in the value of the Rand that we appoint expensive commissions of enquiry to listen to conspiracy theories involving bank malfeasance and profit-seeking traders. The truth, of course, is much simpler than that: your Western governments just want to keep the black man down.

Such technical reasons aside, all you really need to know is that the exchange rates against the Dollar, Pound, Euro or Yen can move by three or four percent in a single day. Under exceptional circumstances – such as when the black man requires a particularly good stomping – the rates have been known to move by more than ten percent in a week, in either direction.

So, basically, your money may suddenly be worth more, or less, than when you left home with, and unless you are watching the exchange rate you won’t even know it until you reach the front of the foreign exchange queue.

If you can’t afford that kind of risk, pin down the exchange rate before you leave. Depending on your bank there are a couple of ways to do this: rand-denominated travellers cheques (or travellers checks as you bloody Americans insist on misspelling it), pre-paid debit cards that pretend to be credit cards (also denominated in rands), or a foreign-currency account with your bank.

Most of us locals don’t take those kind of precautions when we visit abroad, because the risk isn’t really all that big unless you plan to spend hundreds of thousands of rands. A couple of percentage points either way just doesn’t impact on small sums, and one fewer beer from the hotel mini bar isn’t going to kill you. But don’t say we didn’t warn you.

For excellent, free and real-time currency conversion, check out xe.com