Ugandan Economics

So tonight I decided to make my housemates Canadian Pancakes (theirs are made with cassava and bananas...pretty good actually). As I was shopping for ingredients I was reminded of how ridiculously cheap things are here. I made the entire meal (flour, baking powder, 6 eggs, 1 L milk, butter, whole package of salt, whole package of sugar) PLUS the brand new frying pan all for about $11 CAN. Surprisingly (yeah right) I couldn't find maple syrup...we used jam instead. Everytime I buy something I can't get over how cheap it is. Here is a little price list:



One night stay at the nice hotel down the road: $9.00
Pair of decent dress pants: $8.00
Matress for my bed: $18.00
Chicken who is laying eggs (which I am working on purchasing): $4.90
Bottle of Coke: $0.35
Lunch (Matooke, potatoes, g-nut sauce AND a bottle of Coke): $0.97
Motorbike ride to town (about 3km): $0.60
Movie rental: $0.55
My new haircut: $2.25
Box of three pairs of underwear: $1.00 (No I don't care that it stained me blue, although it was a little scary when it happened!)
16 "doughnuts": $0.12
Cup of African tea: $0.10
Internet at the internet cafe: $0.02/minute



The sad thing is that the people here think this is really expensive. Probably because for them it relatively is. Here are some numbers from the other side of the table:

Amount that a person I know makes for managing an organisation: $75/month (very good pay)
Amount a woman gets for the sale of one goat: $12
Amount a woman gets for the sale of a bunch of Matooke: $0.25 (that's one bunch on the side)

Amount for each child to attend school: approximately $500-800/year
Amount to see a doctor: $40
Amount to buy back that same goat that is now butchered: $50


I find the whole money issue to be one of the hardest things for me. I just want to hand it over to people, so little of my money can go so far. It pains me when a little girl walks up to me and says please buy me a bag of popcorn ($0.12) and I have to say "No, sorry I just have enough to buy groceries," just based on principle. You may be wondering what principle...well people here have the thought that white people are rich (and maybe relatively we are). Because they think we are rich they almost expect us to just hand over money. If I started just giving money to every who walked up to me and just straight out asked me for money...I would be broke. There are people who need it, people who don't need it, people who make up (or in some cases have) some great reason, some people who just say "Your white and rich now gimme a couple dollars". I haven't "given" money to anyone yet. I've told a few people to "Keep the change," or give me a free ride next time the see me but I've been told by several Africans to not just give out money, and it makes sense. There are those out there who are truly worthy of monetary aid and I have it in my plans to try and help them. By the way, Charles has gone to the village to help herd cattle with his uncle. I was really sad to see him go but I guess it is better than him just hanging around the town here. I continue to pray for him and via the grapevine have heard that a relative may have found a little extra cash to get him back to school.