Mrs. Butterworth's Withdrawal Pains

No syrup in Rwanda. Why, I’m not sure. There’s definitely an ex-pat market for the stuff. Since there are other imported items of questionable popularity—sauerkraut in huge gallon tins—I’m not sure why no one has thought to import some Mrs. Butterworth’s or even the South African brands we saw in Namibia, but no syrup. There are even areas that grow sugar cane, but nope, no syrup. How, we wonder can a people exist without syrup?

My kids have been eating pancakes with powdered sugar or yogurt or just plain sugar. Plain sugar by the way is of the variety we get in Louisiana straight from the mill—the brown chunky kind of crystal stuff which doesn’t exactly dissolve into the butter of one’s pancake. So, the complaints have abounded regarding appropriate pancake toppings. Having made simple syrups for things like pralines, I thought I’d give it a try for the more tasty variety.

I downloaded a simple recipe from the internet that contained available ingredients. I managed to find “real” brown sugar at one of the importers in town. This fellow is a Greek who speaks impeccable French and good English. He gets shipments from Europe on a weekly basis. One has to be quick because he’s somewhat of a wholesaler and the smaller shops buy from him to stock their shelves. What he receives varies from week to week. So one week he may have American style cereal, the next he may not. The smaller shops mark up the products considerably, so buying from him is actually cheaper although anything imported here is outrageously expensive. Virtually all manufactured goods are, so living on a budget just isn’t very feasible if one is used to Western-style products.

So, this kilo of brown sugar I bought cost 6000 RwF, about $10 US! One of my friends asked to split it with me because out of principle she just couldn’t pay $10 for brown sugar! I agreed even though I probably could have used 2 or 3 packages of the stuff. I was finding it hard to swallow forking out $10 US myself! But, what to do, what to do?

Last night was breakfast night and we tried out the syrup. It was a little runny, but the flavor was good even though I hadn’t the requisite maple extract to add to it. The kids ate all of the pancakes and gobbled up all of the bacon (one of the few things here that resembles its American equivalent). The syrup got an appreciative nod, but it wasn’t like they were falling over themselves to compliment it. And to think I buy Mrs. Butterworth’s in the gallon container at the Super Wal-Mart at home!

I hope my kids are learning about being a privileged breed in this world from their Rwanda experience. From their behavior and comments though, it sounds like the only lesson they’re getting from this is that their parents are enjoying their deprivations! Perhaps, one day, in retrospect they’ll get it. A parent can only remain hopeful.

(above: Brown sugar or gold? Luckily I brought the huge bottle of vanilla extract with me because that can't be found here either. Vanilla sugar is sold in packets here, just not the same!)