A Little More Toothpaste in Bala Behmenli

Well, my Muslim refugee druggist in Bala Behmenli finally got her Kiva funding. It was dispersed first of the month. Actually, though, I don't think she's a druggist at all. She's just a normal person who sells little boxes of antibiotics and 'medicinal preparations', as you can see in the picture. She borrowed a thousand bucks to add toothpaste and shampoo and that kind of gimcrackery. Thinks people will buy it if she stocks it.

Small business. Buy low! Sell high! I used to be in the marijuana business in a small way in my youth. I'd go in with friends to buy a ki, then we'd split it up into little one ounce baggies and sell those for three or four times what we'd paid wholesale. The goal was to pay the rent, eat, get high ourselves, and earn enough extra to do it again. I liked how easy it was to make money, but I didn't like the part about going to San Quentin, so I got a job tending a Mexican import shop on Haight Street instead. That was my one experience with life as a businessman. Just didn't have that entrepreneurial spirit.

Ayshan is a lot gutsier. Or maybe she likes hanging around the store all day making money. Azerbaijani manat signs dancing in her eyes (that's their currency. I looked it up). And what else is she going to do? She got thrown out of her home village because of the war with Armenia and she's got to make a living in a new village - her and half a million other 'internally displaced' refugees.

So why did I lend her $25 to buy wholesale toothpaste? I think it's because I love capitalism. We need more people to buy low and sell high. Then the world will be a better place like it is here.

Or maybe I just thought, "Hey. Twenty-five bucks. I can afford it. I think I'll just take a chance she guessed right about all those villagers wanting their toothpaste and shampoo."