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Guyanese Becoming Experts at Mental Arithmetic
(Kaieteur News) Guyanese people developing a new skill, and is not cricket, football or liming. Is mental arithmetic, because these days yuh cannot walk into a supermarket without doing calculations in yuh head like yuh preparing for CXC Mathematics.
Once upon a time yuh used to push a cart through the supermarket and pick up things without worrying too much. Now every item got yuh stopping, squinting at the price tag and asking, “But wait, this was how much last week?”
Inflation done turn shopping into an examination. And there is no calculator allowed, because by de time yuh take out yuh phone, yuh already have three more items in the cart and the cashier looking at yuh like yuh holding up the Commonwealth Games.
People now calculating de price of every item plus VAT before putting it in de cart. Some shoppers does even calculate what de total would be if dem remove the cheese, the juice and de biscuits. Others reach de cashier and suddenly discover that some groceries have become “luxury items” and quietly send dem back to de shelf.
And bora? Lord have mercy!
Bora now reaching $1,000 for a few strings. A few years ago yuh could buy bora and still have change for a drink. Today yuh does look at a bundle of bora and wonder whether it was grown in a greenhouse at ExxonMobil. At this rate, market vendors gon’ need security guards, because people gon’ start asking for bora on hire purchase.
The frightening thing is that yuh can spend thousands of dollars and still come home with a bag that looking like yuh only went to buy toothpaste.
The supermarket cashier used to say, “Anything else?”
Now yuh does answer, “No, please. I done risk enough.”
Inflation has made Guyanese into financial strategists. We comparing brands, calculating unit prices, mentally adding VAT and deciding whether we really need the thing we just picked up.
We have become experts at mental arithmetic.
The only problem is that the answer always does come out the same: “Put that back.”
Talk Half! Leff Half!
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