Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin isn't legal in some countries but even if in some countries, it's legal, one still have to face hassle if they want to use bitcoin in every step of real life. Most of the shops don't accept it.
In my local, it's not illegal but no one accepts bitcoin as currency or payment method. However, last week, I was in vacation and decided to use bitcoin for a whole 1 day. As bitcoin isn't allowed here, I choose one local guy(he owns a local exchange) who exchange bitcoin for my native currency. I decided not to use any fiat directly from my pocket. What I did, whenever I was in need of fiat, I had to contact with that local guy and sent him BTC for fiat. I could have done it at once but I choose to exchange only if I need. I could have used localbitcoin but it requires more time.

10 PM
I need approx $30 for transportation cost and I talked with the guy over phone and exchanged 0.02 BTC for fiat. I bought ticket and spent some fiat for foods. I had a few bucks left in my pocket. I reached at destination at 04:00 am and I had to have rent a room but I didn't have enough fiat. I called that guy at 4 am, he didn't picked the phone since he was sleeping. So, I had to spend some times at waiting room, at some point I slept for a while  ;D
I had a few bucks left from yesterday, spent these on breakfast. Again, I called that guy and this time, he picked up the phone. We had talked for some minutes, he was asking me to exchange all the amount I need to but I decided not to exchange these at once. So, I exchanged 0.05 BTC this time and rented a room. I spent couple of hours there. Later, went out for having some fun. After completing my lunch, I came back to room and had a rest for some times. In afternoon, I had visited some places, had some food.Then I came back to my room and had rest for couple of hours before going to dinner. I had left some fiat from the previous exchange. I used these for dinner and left almost nothing. I decided to exchange the rest 0.03 BTC because I had to have breakfast at morning. I slept till 8 am. Later, I got freshed and took my breakfast before getting back to my home.

Conclusion
You probably have easily read the whole story but only I know how much pain it was when I had to wait almost 5 hours without a single fiat money. I had done this only out of my curiosity. We are still far away from using bitcoin as our daily currency.

P.S- I had fiat option to pay since I had my card with me. I took it to avoid any unexpected issue.

Basically you are not using any BTC for your needs in that day as you paid everything with fiat. Indeed you did not spend any fiat money directly from your wallet but you exchange your BTC first to get fiat. In conclusion, it is impossible to live with no fiat if you live in a place when there is no store/merchant that accepts bitcoin as payment method. I'll have the same experience with you if I try to do the same thing in my country.

True,when i read up the entire story this do shows that op do spend out fiat still and not his bitcoin yet he do make conversions with his friend.Its a normal scenario would happen if
there were no merchant do accepts bitcoin directly on a certain place which you would surely end up on this kind of situation.Instead on hassling yourself on making conversions and wasting your bitcoin
its much better to stick with your fiat spending.

Although bitcoin isn't legal on my country but I can spend whole life with bitcoin payment. Because I can easily exchange bitcoin to my native currency. Huge demand for bitcoin on my country. On the other hand I am one of them who made lot of local re-seller. So if I ask anyone for exchange by bitcoin with native currency then they will pay local currency in advance. So I have no problem for sell it. But it's true that I can't spend bitcoin directly in my country since its not legal there. Even now I am on abroad but I am selling bitcoin with my local currency and getting paid on local bank.  

Well basically if you would think about it he is paying with Bitcoin because the money he is spending is came from crypto.
Even though it is not directly Bitcoin payment I would still consider it as a day with Bitcoin because what he spent is all from crypto .

The hassle is real. This is the few set back that bitcoin and other cryptocurrency have. Sooner or later there will be major adoption from a merchant and store around the world to use crypto as a source of payment. Also depending on which country you are taking a vacation.

At least we learned that it is really hard to use bitcoin for regular living especially if the country does not know or support it. Though I agree that most payments are done in fiat, I think it's the only OP can do it.

Off course man. We are far far away from easy usage of bitcoin as a payment method. When there is nobody to accept it for purchase goods you have to exchange it into fiat and that is pain in the a**  :D  Adoption on the largest scale and companies and firms paying salary in bitcoin( off course if its value stabilize completely). Then we can talk about bitcoin as everyday currency, spending for basic life needs...

We are yet to see fully-functioning services that accept bitcoins directly, but until then we should be happy seeing that some people are already willing to meet compromises in order to learn about the tech, and how to possibly integrate it into their businesses and services as well. Perhaps with the return of bitcoin debit cards (the legitimate ones, of course) will we see the rise of interest in bitcoin again since that's one compromise we'll have to take if we really want to take our bitcoins somewhere, though I'm not yet affixed to the idea that it's the only way to get the word out.

I think it depends on where you live. I believe in some places like Japan or Switzerland, you can pretty much find a local shop or a restaurant accepting bitcoin as payment very easily as those countries have been embracing cryptos for a very long time so it wouldn't be surprising to find people accepting btc (although maybe not to the point of being a "daily currency"), or at least that's how I perceive the acceptance of cryptos in those countries, perhaps someone who lives there can correct me if I'm wrong.

But yeah, other than in some crypto-friendly countries, using Bitcoin for day-to-day stuff like getting a taxi or buying breakfast it's almost impossible.

The conclusion is that it's almost impossible to live by only sing bitcoin on a daily basis in most of the countries around the world. There are a few shops here and there accepting bitcoin but those are rare and definitely not enough to complete all your daily needs. Regarding to your story I think you should have exchanged all your bitcoin in one transaction so you would have waited only a few hours than you could do anything you want for the rest of the day.

Hope you did not try any daily usage option by using bitcoin. For example you can pay your internet, mobile or electricity bills on few site or app paying bitcoins.
Then cheapair.com site is providing options to buy the tickets on their site with bitcoins and get some discounts.

purse.io is one of the site where you can buy things on amazon with certain discounts and offer. Why you people trying this options and saying when we can use bitcoin everyday and so on.

I am sharing link to find bitcoin accepting places to learn more about it.

https://coinsutra.com/who-accepts-bitcoins/

There is a service in my country where I can convert bitcoin into fiat in demand. So if I would do what Op have done, it is not that hard. I will not have to wait for someone to pick up the phone and convert my btc to fiat.

But I think, the convenience of converting btc to fiat is counter productive. There is lesser demand for shops to accept btc since most people are converting it to fiat. This is reality, atleast in my country.

i would like to see someone try it in a day without converting btc. I know in some countryit is viable.

I have at least two years without earning anything in fiat, what little i get, is all in bitcoin. So anytime i need to spend something, i hit localbitcoins and exchange as little as possible, basically the needs for that day. This is because the fiat we use here had become the worst of the planet, thanks to the politicians.

So your single day experience, for me has already been a couple of years. And while this is doable, it hurts not being able to keep them for the future...

Contrary to the misleading media, there is almost no place that accepts bitcoin directly here. There are like a couple of places that claim to accept bitcoin, but the exchange rate would be a complete ripoff compared to exchanging it yourself first. And once you have the fiat, you don't need to wait for confirmations (but instead have to pray the stupid bank debit card works). Yes this is a cashless country, not by choice but by force...

You can at least still freely choose to use your fiat, probably even in physical form...

good story, when a country banns crypto transactions or doesn't care about crypto, then the government's decision only makes it difficult for us to make transactions using BTC.

Our challenge today is to spread BTC to the public, so that it will create a great public enthusiasm towards BTC, and that will encourage the government's attention to legalize BTC.

For now and in the next few years it is true that we cannot possibly live without fiat money. but think about it in the next 20 or 30 years, when technology is getting more sophisticated and everything is very different then using digital currencies is a possibility. in the future we can achieve a much higher level of sophistication and when all facilities and infrastructure are adequate then everything can be far more likely to happen.

Your story is not exactly the story of using bitcoin directly. It's just that you have exchanged bitcoin for local fiat and used that as a currency. I do it every month and it is very normal for a lot of people here. If you had used bitcoin directly, that would have been interesting!

I have been saying this for a long time that, without government regulation in place, bitcoin is not going to see mass adoption. And without mass adoption, bitcoin won't be used as a currency where we can use it for our daily expenditures. Once we have government regulations in place, the story will be different.

you are missing the point of bitcoin. all you explained here was the "pain" of converting bitcoin to fiat. that has never been the point of bitcoin. the whole point is that when bitcoin is adopted and used as a currency you should no longer need to convert it to fiat, you simply pay with bitcoin just like you pay with fiat.
your statement however is correct in a way but your reasoning is wrong. we are far from using bitcoin as daily currency only because 1. people still prefer it as investment rather than a currency, 2. merchants don't accept it when they see #1 and the volatility.

As you have said: "In my local, it's not illegal but no one accepts bitcoin as currency or payment method.". So that's it, you really need to exchange your Bitcoin to your local currency, but it's a good social experiment though. There are only a couple of country out there that really adopts bitcoin as currency, Switzerland, which has a lot of store accepting it, and Japan, who we all know adopted bitcoin just like their local currency. I have to agree though that it is far from being accepted as mode of payment because of so many factors, i.e. volatility of the market.

..you have said that "In your local, it's not illegal but no one accepts bitcoin as currency or payment method"..the necessity in the use of bitcoin in your country is not yet fully adopted which cause you to convert your btc into your own fiat money to be able to survive in your one day journey..opposite here in my place..Bitcoin is not illegal,,it is accepted by the community and you can use it in your day to day transactions like paying bills,buying loads,games credits, even you can convert your bitcoins in your fiat money etc..you can gain freely bitcoins as long as you can afford to buy it,, but there is still a need to use our fiat money because not all transactions nor merchants are accepting Bitcoin as mode of payment..Reality based,,Bitcoin can not easily replace fiat money..

To use Bitcoin as a regular currency, we need a support center for these payment transactions. There is a need for an application provider that supports private exchange like banks' online payment applications.

it is difficult to use Bitcoin if it is not illegal in your the country and does not accept payments at shopping stores with Bitcoin. if want to spend a day with Bitcoin then must have a lot of BTC on account card to exchange for fiat money. in my country Bitcoin is also not illegal and I usually have to exchange BTC first with fiat money for shoping, same like you.

From your story I think you trouble yourself because if you accept the suggestion from your friend to convert all BTC that you will need in your vacation then you will be fine, without having to wake up your friend and even wait 5 hours to pay a hotel. We must be aware to use bitcoin in all daily lives we need government, they have authority to accept bitcoin and to ban bitcoin in theirs country, we must respect it. However, in your story we have a learning and we can take it for those people who will go to vacations, if you have bitcoin in wherever a place you are then you don't need to be afraid to run out of paper money and find a place for money changers. Just find someone in this forum then you can find it easily.

But I think that crypto token will become the main stream currency one day sooner or later. Each currency has its development process. I am look forward that day. ;D ;D ;D

This shows that bitcoin is not  used in some countries. This doesn't mean that one can purchase goods on some online store with the use of bitcoin. I believe with time, although I don't know how long, bitcoin will be globally used for different transactions. This is very possible because bitcoin has come a long way, starting from a low price ten years ago to what it is now. It has promising positive impact in our financial world.

I wish I were in a place where I can purchase anything with bitcoin. I would use direct bitcoin if it was available here. The problem is there's no merchant is accepting bitcoin.

The purpose of this adventure (I call it adventure) is only to show how much hassle spending bitcoin is if you are living in a country where bitcoin isn't accepted in any shop or anywhere.
Some are mentioning Japan, Switzerland. Not everywhere you will find bitcoin accepted shop. If you only oath to spend bitcoin, trust me, you will face more hassle than me.

that is the problem with adoption not bitcoin. it is a slow process that can take years before you can call it adopted and see it accepted in most places.
for example when something like PayPal first came out, nobody even trusted it let alone want to use it. if you went to some shop and wanted to pay with it, nobody would have accepted it. but nowadays it is used a lot more although it is terrible and has a lot of issues. and even today in some countries they don't even know what PayPal is!
bitcoin is the same, except that unlike PayPal there is a lot of FUD against it which is slowing the adoption down even more.

You should have been using your fiat money. If nobody in your place accepts bitcoin as payment then, it will be bad for your situation. If you will force yourself in having bitcoin as a payment with your current situation, then you're risking yourself out of your own mistake. Stick with fiat, there would be a day when bitcoin will be used by many. Don't force it out yet.

I think that is simply what point Op is making. Having bitcoin in your wallet while you can not disburse it freely and directly to take care of what you want because there are no direct usage can be frustrating for anybody. This is the reason we need to understand whether the area we are travelling to uses bitcoin rather than believing that it is used there to avoid being frustrated.

           In the future, crypto (especially Bitcoin) will be used as a means of payment in all developed countries and in developing countries. But it will not happen too soon, because most traders are not open minded, and they are afraid to adopt this method of payment. The crypto market needs a better promotion so that people get curious and inform about that market. FIAT currencies will never disappear from the world.

They still using this as a financial assets instead of using it for daily basis, transactions can be done smoothly if more and more people who will be willingly adopt the system, for now we can't argue about the actual usage especially to those place where knowledge about bitcoin is not that much.

This thing indicates that the majority of the population there's still unfamiliar with the existence of bitcoin perhaps due to a lack of socialization. Besides that maybe bitcoin in your location hasn't been fully supported by the government, so you can not feel the positive benefits that bitcoin brings especially in making transactions. But the good thing is that bitcoin there's considered not illegal so this condition can trigger the presence of new influencers there, and your whole story will probably be different with what will happen in the future.

Yes, we understand your motive for posting this and we know Bitcoin to fiat conversion is a pain in the ass, but it is not a Bitcoin limitation. You should save up some money for a holiday in a country where Bitcoin adoption is much higher and then repeat this experiment, where you only deal with direct Bitcoin payment for products and services and then give your opinion on this again.

I did this and I had a great time <hassle free> and without any capital control restrictions. <Bitcoin holiday>  ;D

Every day I am active with bitcoin where always discuss bitcoin in bitcointalk forum with many people around the world and asking about new signal which one coins better for investing and buying for long term or short term.

well, your day with btc was actually a day with exchanger....

You should have a career in sales. I can't believe you sold bitcoin to someone completely unaware of bicoin before. Most of my experience when introducing bitcoin to a someone is indifference. If everyone have the same acceptance with bitcoin, adoption would be an ease.

When there were no cards and there were only Fiat. I could not imagine that when we will pay with cards. Now we can not imagine life without them. It seems to me that it will be the same with Bitcoin. In the future, it will be perceived as something everyday. I can't even imagine a day without having to look at the course of cryptocurrency.

using bitcoin in a day is very hard because only few merchant tin he world that accept bitcoin, and i think it will be hard to use it like our fiat daily, so i hope in the future we cna use bitcoin daily without worry the price of bitocin is dropping and not stable

There is a service in my country where I can convert bitcoin into fiat in demand. So if I would do what Op have done, it is not that hard. I will not have to wait for someone to pick up the phone and convert my btc to fiat.

But I think, the convenience of converting btc to fiat is counter productive. There is lesser demand for shops to accept btc since most people are converting it to fiat. This is reality, atleast in my country.

i would like to see someone try it in a day without converting btc. I know in some countryit is viable.

Well I think it really depends on your country or where you are going to spend it.
In our country we could easily convert crypto into Fiat with just few clicks because of our local wallet,
I also hope that in the future we could pay anything with our crypto without converting it so it would save as much time and effort.

You should just not keep your money in virtual places.

I mean you should split them into several different locations such as online wallet, Trezor or even your bank.
Considering we are talking about some money to be used for real life situations such as yours.

By having both money in your bank, with you and at some online wallet you will be able to use every 3 payment types which will make your life easier.

You have to understand (as you are aware) not all local shops have bitcoin transactions for their payments.

Man, your activities actually show that you did not spend a single day using bitcoin only  :-[. Unfortunately, all you did was spend fiat currency. Not to offend you or anything, but that was plain stupid to keep on exchanging small amount of bitcoin for fiat. You could have done it all together and spend yourself from trouble. The story would have been a whole different thing if it was like you spent bitcoin to pay for things directly but faced some problems. But all you did was exchange bitcoin for fiat and then spend everything normally.

Exchanging Bitcoin for fiat in that way sounds unique. It is a good example of peer-to-peer transactions. The direct p2p transaction is probably why it is faster than LocalBitcoin. I used to think  LocalBitcoin and similar p2p exchanges were the fastest for peer-to-peer transactions.

it is true that bitcoin is not legal in some countries, but you said that there are countries where bitcoin is legal and even is legal many merchants do not accept bitcoin as a means of payments. It is necessary to understand certain things here, first the parliament of these countries must create laws that say that bitcoin is legal and that can be used as means of payments and what will be the forms of tax payments, consumer protection, control of money laundering, as traders will set prices so as not to be prejudiced because of volatility, among other things, this is a long process that should have already begun in many countries. In countries such as mine for example, it still lacks much knowledge to be absorbed by the population before some merchant dreams of accepting bitcoin as a means of payment. My country's parliament is constituted of people who do not seem to be proactive in technology, so I have serious doubts if in 5 years it will be possible to legalize bitcoin in my country

You did not use BTC directly
Because you were bought by Fiat in the end
But it is an exciting experience and you try to spread the idea
Suggestion .. Next time ask every shop you enter Why do not you accept BTC ?

Localbitcoin is a hassle for me because it requires NID. Moreover, you can't exchange BTC instantly. At least, you can't sell instantly although you can purchase instantly. I'm locking the thread.