Super Market Challenge

I go grocery shopping once a week.  I try to go early and on a weekday.  Saturday shopping in a large grocery store can be frustrating.  It will be crowded and people are in a hurry.  Most of the time,  even on weekdays I feel a bit stressed by the time I reach my car to unload my cart.

It all starts when I lock my car and take my two large plastic bags over to where I stick in a euro into the cart lock.  The market makes sure that they don't lose any carts to homeless people.  I don't know why they do this as there are no homeless people in my area.  Italy does not have the kind of homeless situation such as found in America.  I will get my euro back when I return the cart, it is just kind of a free rental situation.

I head into the market and my first stop is the vegetable area.  Italy has fairly good produce and where it came from is stated above the item.  Cabbage from Germany, apples from Spain, you will know what country it came from.   Even in the fish market we find listings of where the fish originated.


I will find 4 types of tomatoes, and right now the little round ones are the best tasting, while the big ones have no taste at all.  You pay more for the little ones, of course.  There will be 6 choices of apples, 3 lemons, 3 strawberries, 2 bananas, and your basic selection of vegetables such as broccoli, green and white cauliflower, and 3 choices of potatoes from different areas. 

What I find missing that I would like to see are small potatoes, berries, limes, and small carrots.  I will almost never find chili peppers that are hot.  Sometimes in August I can find them if I am lucky.  This is why I grow my own.

Leaving the veggie area is when it gets a bit maddening.  Italian shoppers drive their carts like southern Italians drive.  They have no concern for others, it is a "me first" world for them.  They cut in front, make turns immediately which cause a person to stop and not bang into their cart. They block the aisle, stopping to make a choice, or most maddening, they block the aisle while talking to another Italian.  I will wait and wait and hope they will notice that I cannot go forward, but mostly they don't have a clue.  It is just their way of shopping.  Sometimes there will be a line of folks wanting to go forward, but grandma has found an old friend and be damned with everyone else.   Beware of Grandma and Grandpa shopping together!

One also has to deal with the speed shoppers.  These are the people who are shopping alone and are pulling a overloaded small plastic cart behind them.  Someone shot off a starter gun and they are hustling through the store, making everyone else wait while they cut across the aisles without any concern for the direction most people are going.  These people never look you in the eye, its head down, full speed ahead.   I think they learned how to drive in Naples, a city famous for horrendous drivers.

Fish Anyone?
Between the vegetable area and the specialty meats in my store one will find a person cooking fried fish items.  I hurry quickly on to the milk area holding my breath.  The smell is not one I could get attached to.  Even my Italian wife hates that stinky fish stand. 

Not To Be Found
Italy is beginning to catch up with world flavors.  When I first moved to the Veneto I had to hunt to find anything with hot spicy flavor.  I could not find anything Mexican, and not much from Asia.   I began to fill my suitcase like a smuggler when I came back from visiting the states.  Avocados were hard to find, limes I could find in one big market called Iperlando.  But now these things are beginning to show up.  In my market, Ali, there is an area of shelves 4 feet wide which has world food items.  This is still small in comparison to the one area I found last weekend in Scotland shown here.
This Is Only Half Found In Scotland
   

                                    GB American Supermarkets

If you want to know a little about Italians, I can tell you, as I have written before,  that most of them do not appreciate hot spicy food.  When I have guests and we have Mexican food, I put several bottles of different types of hot sauce on the table.  My Italian friends have to be bugged to try them.  Hardly none like the taste.  In fact, in Chinese restaurants here, the usual Chinese hot spicy items are not to be found.  The Chinese folks know not to serve spicy.  We have to ask for it when we go.  You will not find hot chili oil on the table, you have to ask.  In a sushi restaurant they usually give a small dab of wasabi, we have to ask for more.  This is how it is in Italy.  It is sad to me that Italians never really get to taste the real thing.  (BTW Italians eat a lot of pizza when visiting foreign countries.  Seriously!)




We buy our drinking water in the market.  The cost is around 30 cents for a liter and a half bottle.  We buy it by the 6 pack.  You can have plain or fizzy.  Our tap water at home is clean and okay to drink but I like the taste of fizzy.  When we were in California last summer I noticed that water there was hugely expensive.  That is strange to me after 10 years in Italy. 

After battling the other shoppers aisle after aisle it is time to check out.  This is the most frustrating part for me.  Here is what happens.
The moving belt area where you place your items is way too small.  My plan is to get my stuff onto that belt and move quickly past the checker and begin loading my bags.  This does not always work out well as I have a week's worth of food.  Finally when I get to the bagging area (checkers do not help bag, you are on your own) I begin throwing things into my plastic shopping bag. I try to put the heavy stuff on the bottom, but as I am bagging the lady is pushing my items down and they are piling up.  I try NOT to look at the shoppers behind me waiting as they will always have the look as if to say, "MG why can't this guy go faster we are in a hurry!"
I am throwing things into my bags as fast as I can, but I never beat the checker who seems pleased to announce how much the total is.  Then she sits and stares at me while I finish.  It is always a frustrated stare.  I have discussed this with my Italian friends and they tell me that this is normal, this horse race to the finish.  I will never get used to it, actually remembering when stores used to have a bagger and a checker.  Now they even have a do it yourself checking stand.  I refuse to use those because they have eliminated a person's job.  One of the "modern" things I really hate!

Apple Cider Not Found Here
Finally my bags are full and back in my cart, I pull out my wallet and fish out my euros.  I look at  the checker but she is too busy to look at me, her customer.   She pulls out the change and the receipt, placing both on a small plastic area.  Italians don't like to put the change in your hand.  Usually she won't look at me, and instead turns to greet the next customer.  I sure miss the "How are  you today" and the "Have a nice day". 


Now I am on my way to my car, pushing my wandering cart.  I say wandering because shopping carts in Italy do not  go straight.  Any dip in the road, any non level place will send my cart in another direction.  By this time I am spotted by an African and he is headed my way.  These fellows hang out in market parking areas and try to "help" people with their groceries.  Even when I tell them I don't need help, then still follow me to my car.  I intentionally park in the furtherest spot for exercise, they will go all the way with me.  It is their hope that I will relinquish my cart to them and they can collect the euro rental fee when returning the cart.  Sometimes they get lucky, but usually not as I support a guy from Nigeria that lives in my village.

This is my typical shopping day in Italy.  I wish you a happy day and a world of peace.  Ciao!

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