Ethiopia: Staying Within Boundaries! – allAfrica.com

Months back a mother of three finds herself in a situation which, as unexpected as it was, really shook her to the marrow.

Her eldest daughter becomes a ninth grader in a new school and amidst new friends who came from various parts of the city and different economic backgrounds too. Yes, they’ve school uniforms and that greatly helps from economic issues weighing on the minds of the youngsters. In time when there are parents who give ten thousand birr pocket money for their junior secondary kids, yes, the display of economic might on the part of the ‘luckier’ students could greatly impact on the teaching, learning process.

Barely a month has passed since the start of school when she comes up with a demand. She demands that her parents buy her a pair of rather expensive shoes because all her friends in school wore those types of shoes! This came as a thunderbolt to her parents especially her mother who was taken by surprise and utter shock. Her father worried that his temper might get the best of him and lead him to doing something he might later regret, leaves the matter to his wife.

In a way it was a smart move as the mother was a much cooler and reserved woman who has the patience to listen the whole day to any nonsense just not to make the other party feel offended and think ill of her. If anyone could talk sense to her daughter whose desire for those modern pair of shoes has pushed really out of her fresh brains it was her. She sits with her daughter and tells her the reality of the family and how they actually were surviving on a very tight budget where every month they had to borrow from someone to make ends meet.

Not that these were new information to the young girl. It’s not that she doesn’t know; she does! But at that maybe it was peer pressure, or maybe it was the desire to be seen heads and shoulders taller than her friends, and part of her brains were open to reason and reality. Mom had to make the decision. She said, no; his tem they don’t have the financial means to fulfill her daughter’s demand. “Listen my dear, we are in dire financial probes at present. Haven’t you seen all the empty sacks and buckets in the kitchen?” The calling price for the type of pair of shoes she asked for was nothing less than seven and, eight thousand birr. That was lots and lots of money for the struggling family. Without exaggeration that kind of money would cover the family’s budget for two months and still manage to save some amount on the sides, however little.

The daughter wasn’t ready to listen to reason like most her age aren’t these days. So the mother tells her she would talk it over the father and get back to her. No, she didn’t mean it when she said she would talk it over with dad. There was nothing to talk over and she knew it. The next day she again tells her daughter her demand was beyond their means. From that moment on the daughter’s behavior complete changes and she became the quietest member of the family. She doesn’t talk and mostly passes her time in the children’s bedroom, a very narrow room which could be anything but a bedroom! Then nightmares set in with her groaning and even wailing in the middle of the night and her two younger brothers were having a hard time to sleep.

Such behavior not normal in the household her parents were scared. Were they going to lose their daughter because they can’t manage to satisfy her wishes? They can’t let that happen! Her dad goes around and manages to borrow eight thousand birr. The pair of shoes were bought and even months later they haven’t yet paid back even a third of the money thy borrowed. The talk of town here is that many parents are suffering because of concerted demands form their children to buy some modern pair of shoes or clothes.

Sometime back a young fellow in his early twenties gets unexpected money, more than a hundred grand, from a group of long lost friends in Europe and America. The sty is that this friends having heard about how high the cost of living has gone decide to contribute some and send it to their childhood friend. They probably thought, a hundred grand being far from groundbreaking contribution, it would help as some financial cushion for their friend. You know what the first thing the young man did was? he buys the smartphone of his dream; an eighty-five thousand birr shiny toy! Mind you, his family managed only a very modest living, meaning that they were never starved but also never knew what abundance in the kitchen was. And the guy buys an eighty grand smartphone!

At first he went around flashing his smartphone anywhere there were a group of people. He was so lost in fantasy he almost could have shouted, “Hey, everybody! Look at the smartphone I have. That’s what is called class!” Then reality sets in. Every other person he comes across tells him he might as well keep his smartphone in his pockets or else the phone snatchers would come after him. At first he laughed away all the warnings. Then, after hearing stories of people who have lost their hundred-thousand birr phones to phone snatchers he, for the first time, started pulling out his phone selectively, meaning when there were incoming calls and when he was in places he thought were safe. His phone most of the time tucked in his pocket, the thrill of flashing it anywhere and everywhere he went practically withered away. He just couldn’t keep up with the tension that his eighty-five thousand birr toy taken away increasing he decides to part with it, and starts looking for the best bidder. The best he has yet been offered is forty thousand birr! Barely a couple of months since he bought it he is now looking to sell it to the best bidder. They say the best offer he got till now was forty grand! Had he tried to live within his means this might not have happened.