I was wondering if we shouldn't discuss some current prices in our own countries or where we're living.
As the Euro recently achieved parity with the dollar, American tourists this past year didn't get a break but it was a bit easier to calculate.
When I travel I like to establish prices for things I buy often to get an idea. The Euro is easier as in the old days, you needed three little Lira bills to buy an ice cream cone in Italy, a pocket full of coins in France.
Now it's about one Euro fifty for a standard ice cream bar you get out of the freezer.

Salaries are not higher here..but lower.

Oh yes, it's about 4 Euros forty here in France for gas per gallon.

What else would you like to know about your neighbors in the world?
I'd like to know how much an ice cream cone costs in Belgium in Euros, is it the same?
A meal?
A haircut?
A doctor's visit?

So this is like our own Big Mac Index??

An icecream (a cone with 3 flavours) costs E 1,50 (No Euro on my keyboard...).
About the cheapest haircut you can get costs E 15,-
As for a doctor's visit I'm not absolutely sure, but it's around E 17,-
Gas is E 1,15 a litre (if I understand correctly what you mean by gas... I don't know how much a gallon is, hence the litre thing)

Sounds as though the prices are about the same.
I had a haircut in Italy and it cost about 15 € but that was unusual.
How about a pair of shoes?

As I don't own a car I can't comment of gas/petrol prices, but you can get a reasonable meal in a restaurant here for 7 to 8 euros. Daily specials are as cheap as 5 euros (not including drinks, of course).

Cup of coffee, about 1 euro (more for a mug).
Chocolate bars approx 0,75 - more if kept in the cooler (necessary here in summer!)
Litre and a half bottle of water approx 0,40 (more if you want it chilled) from a supermarket, more in a restaurant/bar.

Oddly enough, I never eat ice cream and have no idea of the prices. I'll look the next time I'm out.

I bought a reasonably decent pair of walking boots in the local market last Spring for (I think, memory is going) about 20 euros. It might have even been a bit less than that.

In reply to:

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How about a pair of shoes?

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Hmm, tough one! You can get a pair for only E 20,- but I doubt it'll last longer than a year... The shoes I normally wear are about E 100,- and they're still fine after 5 years.

Restaurants with decent meals for 8 Euro are very hard to find here. Even our university restaurant charges 4 Euro!! A normal restaurant meal costs about 10-15 Euro, drinks not included. A cup of coffee costs 2 Euro, a soft drink E 1,75.

We don't drink bottled water here very often, so I have no idea what that would cost, but I can garanty that it's a lot more than you pay, Liz!!

What do you pay for a doctor's visit, Heather?

As I am anti-math, so I'll let you do your own calculating. The going rate today is somewhere in the neighbourhood of 30 Czech crowns to the euro, slightly higher for the dollar.

A pair of relatively decent shoes - 2000 Kc
A half liter of beer - about 20 Kc
Colgate toothpaste - 36 Kc
A visit to the doctor - free (for state health insurance holders)
A visit to the dentist - the same. If you want imported crowns, implants or bridgework, that will cost you for the materials.
Wash, cut, colour and set at Vera's - 236 Kc
Train travel inside the country - roughly 1.5 Kcs per kilometer
Bus travel - a little higher, depending on the route, time and destination.
A really nice dinner for two with a bottle of medium priced Moravian wine, coffee and digestif - 300 - 700 Kc
A Czech CD - 150 600 Kc depending on how popular the artist is.
An imported CD - 1000 Kc and up

I should point out that these are not Prague prices. There you can pay as high as 100 Kc for a beer and who knows for anything else.

Wimm? You around? Wimm is really good at this stuff.
Shoes, it would be very hard to find shoes I couldn't wear out for twenty Euros. I am wearing those Scholls sandals, great shoes to walk around in, and they cost a fortune...about seventy Euros!
For me that is a fortune though.
Our lunch tickets are good for six Euros. You usually top them off. Food is expensive. You could get a sandwich and a drink with one ticket though.
Doctor's visit has been rounded up to twenty Euros.