So sorry for the slow reply here! Things have been nuts at Maker Faire. We agonized over the international shipping cost. Unfortunately, for the preorder campaign, we can’t do anything fancy (shipping crates over and distributing locally) so this is the very lowest we could charge. If you check the #'s on Fedex and DHL you’ll see we’re just passing the cost on, exactly as we’ll pay it. And as you note, you’ll have customs to pay as well.
There are a lot of clever solutions to bring down international shipping, but we just don’t have the resources yet to make that happen. After this is over and we shift to normal pricing, we’ll likely have retailers who can arrange it locally. Of course, at that point the price may go up, so it’s not clear if that’s an improvement.
I wish I had a better answer - this is the best we could do with what we have.