Fujairah Coin Collector hopes to spread love of traditional hobbies among children

In 1988, a young Fujairah school boy was inspired by a popular children’s magazine to start collecting stamps and coins and 23 years later, Saif Mowailah Al-Yamahi, a Sergeant with Fujairah Police is as enthusiastic as ever about his now considerable currency collection worth an estimated Dhs3.7 million.

 

He has amassed more than 16,000 coins and paper currencies from all over the world and a collection representing most, if not all, historic currencies used in this region covering periods from the Greeks to the establishment of the modern Gulf states. He has held a number of exhibitions and plans a few more in the next couple of years under various themes. 

 

Saif sees his hobby as much more than a simple pastime or interest; he believes such hobbies can be a vehicle into self-improvement and education.

He wants to spread the culture of traditional hobbies such specialist collecting and mail correspondences which have all but disappeared in these times of new technologies and instant gratification. 

 

Saif invited Fujairah Observer to his home in Al-Faseel as he began work on a new archiving system. We began the meeting by asking him why and how exactly did all this begin?

 

Saif Mowailah Al-Yamahi: As a child I used to subscribe to the children magazine ‘Majid’, and from my reading and following some of the hobbies and interests they had I was inspired to start collecting stamps, at first, because they had more colour and decorative features. Soon, however, I switched to collecting coins and paper currencies and I soon realized that it was not just a passing phase but something I had a real interest in. I found that I was not collecting stamps and coins for their monetary value but was more interested in their historic and archaeological worth.  

 

Fujairah Observer: Where do you get your collection items from?

SMA: There are various ways; through exchange with other collectors, friends travelling to foreign countries, buying from antique markets, various exhibitions, public auctions and the internet. Currency collecting can be a very hard thing to do and, at times, I’m forced to travel to other countries to buy and collect the currencies I want even though this costs a lot many and effort. 

 

 F.O: What currencies do you mostly collect?

S.M.A: I have a large collection from Asian countries due to the large Asian community residing in the UAE, but I also have currencies from all over the world and, of course, a large collection of historic value going back to the Greek and Roman periods. I also specialise on currencies which have been used by people who lived in this land ever since the Greek period, and right through the Islamic, Persian and Ottoman periods until the British rule who used the Indian rupee; the last foreign currency used before local emirates began issuing their own independent currencies as a precursor for the UAE’s current currency.  

Currently I’m trying to expand my collection of Islamic period coins, which is expansive, high in demand and expensive. I have a good collection right now but I’m still a beginner compared to some other specialist collectors in the region.   

 

F.O: What are some of the oldest and oddest coin or paper currency you have?

S.M.A: I have Chinese coins from 420 BC, a coin of Alexander the Great dating to 330 BC, coins from the Kushan Empire dating to 200 BC, and Greek, Roman and Islamic periods among other things. Perhaps the most peculiar currency I have is the ‘Taweylat Al-Hassa” or “Larin” which are bent bars of Gold, silver and copper issued in Persia and used as currency in the Gulf region in the 17th and 18th centuries. The highest single denomination I have is a banknote of 50 billion from the former Yugoslavia.  

 

F.O: You have collected all the currencies used in this land that currently constitutes the UAE; can you tell us what they are?

S.M.A: The oldest currency is the Greek drachmas, then comes the Islamic dirhams and dinars, the Maria Theresa Thaler, A.K.A Austrian riyal, Ottoman riyal, Persian shahi and dinar, Burgashia paisa (named after a Sultan of Oman & Zanzibar), Indian rupee (consisting of seven variants) and the Qatar and Dubai riyal. There were also a number of commemorative coinage issues by separate emirates such as Fujairah. 

 

F.O: You mentioned that this hobby is a costly one; how much do you estimate it has set you back over the years? And what is the market-value of your collection?  

S.M.A: (Smiling) rather a lot, I’m afraid; I don’t want to think about it too much but I have estimated that I spent considerably more than one million dirhams. It’s not just the purchase value of the coins and other currencies; other costs include the travelling and archiving among other things. 

The market-value of my collection is about Dhs3.7 million, but I don’t look at my collection as a commercial investment for the future because I don’t buy to sell but to acquire what I don’t have. 

 

F.O: What are your aspirations for yourself and your hobby? 

S.M.A: I hope the relevant cultural authorities and institutes can take more interest in this hobby and help spread it more by including it in cultural events. I also hope the education authorities can encourage students to take up such hobbies instead of wasting their time on video games.

 

As for myself, I’m now in the process of re-archiving my whole collection in a professional way and I have plans to establish a permanent exhibition in my own home to increase interest in this hobby and make it more accessible. 

 

Fuad Mohammed Ali