Non-tradable revisited

Last week, we had an unexpected heavy rain. The rain is good for this permanently water-scarce country, so we shouldn't complain. But it raised the humidity above 90%. To better deal with this heat and humidity, I went to have a haircut last Friday. It was unexpectedly cheap. It's not that I went to a boy's barbar shop in a street. Persuaded by JB (who himself had a cut in a boy's barbar), I went to a white-collar ladies salon with AC and LCD TV, where they did shampoo, cut my hair, and even dried my hair. It was not bad at all, although it was nothing comparable to what I expect back in Japan where they shampoo at least twice on a reclining chair, place a large towel over your legs (so that girls can come in skirt!!), bring you some tea, put some hair treatment, and give you some massage around neck and shoulder (yes, this is the standard there.) Anyways, for this reasonable haircut in Cape Verde, I paid 500 escudo, approximately 5 euro, and the street barbar costed JB only 200 escudo, which is around one-seventh or -eighth of what we pay in the States.

The country has been and is going through the construction boom in tourism as well as in residential housing. The economy has shown a steady growth to graduate Cape Verde from the LDC list. Then, why is the price of non-tradable still so cheap? For a probable reason behind this, see Eric's new blog.

By the way, there is something I miss from Japan. It's not Japanese-standard service. After living a few years abroad, I sometimes just don't know how to react to the excess services that I experience during my visit in Japan. What I really miss here are chopsticks. I don't think I've ever lived without them this long time. Well, eating with folks, spoons, or fingers are fine. But, cooking without chopsticks is really troublesome for me.

Do you guys miss something from home?