My first OpEd piece (I never did know what that meant heehee!)
You are not going to believe this! I still can't believe it. And we wonder why the rest of the world doesn't like us. In America, you can buy anything you can imagine. If they make it, it is there somewhere. Maybe a rare Chinese spice that only grows in the Himilayas might be hard to find, but some specialty store will sell it. This Halloween, I've had trouble finding candy corn and pipe cleaners! It's not Halloween without pipe cleaner spiders. heehee! I've heard the candy corn is in a store for $11 US dollars! And after combing the city, Juan Pablo did find pipe cleaners...sold individually...for 1 boliviano each, and as cheap as .50 bolivianos...so we bought 10. Considering you can get a whole bag in the US for like .99 cents...that is crazy! And I find it ironic that most of the items we buy in America are made in third world countries, but they can't even buy them!
Plus, I found a cute Playskool train for their cousin's birthday...he's turning two. It was about $26 US dollars...so I went online to see how much it is back home....$10 at Walmart! And that singing Spiderman that moves his hands...500 and some bolivianos (about $70)...it's $20 at Target.
Now I know food is definitely cheaper down here and clothes are somewhat cheap (nothing beats an Old Navy sale though)...but the clothes and toys made down here aren't that great a quality so they don't last that long. I just had no idea that there are some things you just cannot find down here.
So did everyone already know this?
5 comments:
susan:
i think it has something to do with what it takes to get "stuff" to wherever it's going. for instance, "stuff" is more expensive in hawaii (still the u.s.) because it all has to be shipped there. think about how one or "stuff" gets to bolivia. it's a long trek. it'd be nice if people didn't hate us because we can get pretty much whatever we want. they should hate us for more legitimate reasons (of which i'm sure there are many). can you order your toys online from walmart to be sent to bolivia? i personally don't think kids need that many toys (of course, i don't have any kids either). when i was growing up in the olden days (hahahaha), we pretty much played with one toy (usually a doll) all the time and were jealous of the neighbor kids that got lots of toys. i think we were happier kids though! tomorrow's halloween. boooo! have a good one.
hi. yeah gifts are right in front of our nozez. remember people can sell ideas.. and this idea that we need "toys" a certain type of thing to entertain us just distracts us from what is the most valuable important gift. even if it does come in the form of a "toy" how we relate to it and the person that gives it is meaningful. like this blog is a gift. thanks susan for bringing us all together with your words and family and you! hug.
and thank GOD:)
do you'all have any pumpkins?
We don't have pumpkins (orange ones) they do have huge green ones though. We made a paper mache pumpkin and I will post lots of pictures tomorrow!
that's papier mache. Green pumpkins? What's next, square watermelons?
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