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Herald says the ministry wants to stop potato imports until 31 March. Wholesalers say +IS 30 a sack by end of January. Growers happy, stalls not happy, everybody on the row talking about it since morning.

I will say one thing. Potatoes are not beef. Nobody asks me about potatoes. Nobody asks me about anything, they just come and say "kazy, how much" and I say the price. Simple.

But my neighbour sells potatoes and he was shouting at a Kazakh sack like it owed him money. So there is a thread now.

I priced it stall by stall this morning, because somebody has to. Retail is about 3.90 a kilo like the Herald says. The stall near the Old City gate was 4.10, the one by the scales was 3.80 and swore it was "last week's price". Nobody has put up the price yet. They are all waiting to see who goes first. 😄

Honest numbers from my side: laghman and the potato salads take about 6 kg a day at my aunt's stall. IS 0.60 more a kilo is 3.60 a day. Not the end of the world, but it is every day.

And before somebody asks: no, my aunt will not raise the price for couriers. Free tea on 12 October, the same price all year. She says a courier who runs through the bazaar all day does not pay for the ministry's draft order.

beef_or_lamb posted:

Potatoes are not beef.

True. But you eat them with the kazy. Don't pretend you don't.

The potatoes will ride my bus before they reach the market. That is the only thing I know about this.

Every morning, 6:40, Old City stop. Two sacks on the back seat, one on the step. "Pass the money forward", I say, and what comes forward is a potato. A woman gave me a potato once instead of 1 som. I took it. I did not have the heart.

Seats are a theory anyway. With sacks it is a rumour.

If the sack goes up IS 30 they will still ride the 31. They always ride the 31. There are ten drivers on the 31, all my cousins, all carrying the same sack.

Nu what is all this about halt, price, sack. Detka, listen to old woman.

Potatoes are for pirozhki. Pirozhki with potatoes and fried onion, little dill, a bit of butter in the filling. Who cares if the sack is 130 or 160, you make 40 pirozhki from one kilo and the whole building eats for two days. Koroche, it is not a crisis, it is dinner.

And you, Lena, Route_31, all of you. Eat. You are thin. I can see it from Navbahor.

beef_or_lamb posted:

Nobody asks me about anything

I ask you. Did you eat today? A man who sells kazy all day and is blunt, this man did not eat breakfast. I know this type.

I ate.

Beef or lamb. Never the other thing. Never. A pirozhok with potato is the other thing. But I will not say no to one from tyotya_Valya.

tyotya_Valya posted:

you make 40 pirozhki from one kilo and the whole building eats for two days

Forty from one kilo. Then the sacks will ride my bus anyway. Price up, price down, 6:40, Old City stop, same sacks. Only the faces change. Pass the money forward.

Also the woman with the potato came back. Next week she paid with a coin. I almost missed the potato.

Nu you see, Route_31. Even the potato woman has heart. You should have brought it to me, detka, I would make you pirozhki and you stop being so gloomy. Koroche, halt, no halt, people will eat. It is dinner, not a crisis. Dill I give for free.

And you, driver, eat something before 6:40. You drive on tea, I can tell. Eat. You are thin.

Route_31_Driver posted:

Only the faces change.

That is also my aunt's stall. Same pot, same line at noon. I did the sums again, with the sack at 160: 6 kg a day is about 3.60 more, so around 21 more a week, and that is before anyone raises the laghman by even one som. We will not raise it, she says. She says it every year and then she raises it by half a som and calls it "rounding". 😄

So it is every day, not the end of the world. Tyotya Valya, send me the dill, I will pay in potato salad.