Shopping in Butare

Butare is a university town, and besides Kigali, one of the most cosmopolitan cities, not that that means much. In the market I bought a lightweight Promod jacket for 2500 francs, or $5. It probably goes for 35 Euro in France. At the Lebanese grocery store, I held back from $4 Pringles and Nutella but got some cheaper potato chips (chili lemon and cheesy onion) plus, of course, pineapple waragi (Ugandan gin). For lunch I bought a pizza bread for 35 cents, yoghurt for 40 cents and fresh passion fruit juice for 95 cents. The supermarket has a great restaurant with quality burgers, tuna sandwiches, and ice cream, but I’ll wait until I’ve been here a few months to splurge on that kind of stuff. All told, I spent more money today than I have spent during all of training combined (excluding my cell phone), about $15.

Left, ground meat anyone? From the Lebanese super market on the left in the right photo, where you can find Western food. Also note in the right photo that Google has apparently branched out from their internet business and opened a stationary store.