Two years back, when PyCon was in DC, I was looking at how much it would cost to go. I did the same for this year's Addison-based event, and now I'm looking at how I could make PyCon TX 2007 the first one I go to.

For PyCon DC 2005, the flight price was about R12000 ($1936 at the time). TX 2006 flight prices were around R11100 ($1911 at the time). TX 2007 prices look to be R10118 (only $1358 at the moment). 2005 prices were R6.10 to the dollar, 2006 had R5.80 to the dollar, and currently at R7.45 to the dollar).

Hotels were the next biggest expense. For PyCon 2005, I could find some ultra-cheap hostels in the general vicinity through some suggestions on the wiki. $22 (R140ish at the time) a night. But I think the conference venue was close to $100 (R610 at the time). I only planned to stay for four nights when I thought about this.

With the move to Addison, I didn't find any ultra-cheap links from the Wiki - could find $60 (R350 at the time) for a decent place very close to the conference venue, though. I was thinking of staying 10 days to join the sprinting afterwards too, and found that I couldn't really think about living in an ultra-cheap room for such a long time, and that the hotel price wasn't too scary when moved from four days to ten days in the big picture. The $79 for the conference hotel was definitely in the picture too.

For 2007, it looks like I can get something decent and close for $48ish a night. Currently, that's R358 - more than the $60 cost earlier only a few months ago. For 10 days, that's $480 (R3580). Obviously sharing and so forth can affect hotel pricing quite dramatically.

(As an aside, it's way cheaper to stay in the conference hotel in the US than a decent hotel in Cape Town - especially when it's R5.80 to the dollar).

What's interesting is that despite the Rand's strength, the prices of hotels, flights, and the event are range-bound in Rand terms. In 2005, at R6.10 to the dollar, it was going to cost around R16200 total. Earlier this year, at R5.80 to the dollar, it was going to be R16300 total. At currently weak R7.45 to the dollar, it looks like R15500 is possible.

I imagine this is caused somewhat by the price of the flights dropping roughly R1000 each year.

Flights from London are around R5500. That's just GBP 400. 6 or so nights out. Total would be about R11000 - double "just the flights". Average 3-5year earner is probably between 28k and 45k a year. If you're really good, maybe a month's discretionary spending - possibly two with still going out a bit.

Flights within the US are probably around $250/R1900 (based on a New York-Dallas flight I looked up for a second - anyone have advances on that?). In total, the whole thing would be less than $1000/R7450. I'm not too sure on US salaries for a 3-5 year experience earner, but I imagine it's possible to save that in a month?

In contrast, the brighter 3-5 year experience earners in South Africa earn between R12k and R18k a month. Taking rent and tax and so forth into account, that means saving the base R15k will take quite a while - at least 4 months, but most likely more. Add some spending money...

(Flights to Vilnius for EuroPython 2007 are over R12000 in my searches so far. But hotels and living costs will probably be lower - probably bringing everything on par again.)

I guess this highlights two things: I need to earn more (this never seems to change), and (South) Africans need to try get events closer to them - either making new events, or fooling^Wconvincing people into having their existing events here.

Andrew Dalke suggested we try motivate for a Python sprint in Cape Town. Maybe I should think about how to make that sufficiently attractive.