One of my students is an English major and owns every Harry Potter book, which she bought for list price at the Foreign Language Book Store downtown. Sarah refused to leave the United State until her mother promised to send her the latest book as soon as it was issued by Federal Express. But it turns out that it would have cost over $150 US to send the book to Nanjing, so we bought it here, even though we had to pay list price.
If Sarah could have waited, we could have bought it in the US for $18, but she says that since she’s going to school the day after we get home she simply had to read it now, because everyone else will have read it. Generally, I would have been willing to let her suffer through this trauma, but today she has a bad cold and a little bit of “traveler’s stomach” and I felt sorry for her.
So James and I took a taxi and paid the huge sum of 218 RMB for the brand new hardcover Harry Potter. We tried to make up for this insane spending by shopping at Carrefour (sort of a French version of Wal-mart). But I was very pleased with myself for managing this foray without assistance, except for someone writing down the name of the Foreign Language Book Store, an English speaking clerk explaining the price and giving us directions to the supermarket, and the extremely polite and honest taxi drivers, which are all I have encountered here.
Now the kids want me to start taking the bus. Maybe next week.
3 comments:
Come on Lisa!!
...paid the huge sum of 218 RMB for the brand new hardcover Harry Potter.
HOW much is this in AMERICAN money?? *G*
I am STILL loving this BLOG!
Please tell your class I said Hello!
Bob O'Lary
7.5 RMB to the dollar, so, it's not so much in dollars, BUT... you probably could buy a month's worth of lunches!
Thanks Ted,
I found my calculator and deduced that the book cost $29.00 over there in China.
Do you think LOTS of folks over there were able to afford that much for this book?
Bob O'Lary
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