To market, to market . . .

After supper last night, Vicky said she had to go grocery shopping and asked if I’d like to come along.  Boy, did I!  I had a fresh 100 RMB note burning a hole in my pocket, I hadn’t eaten any candy in days, and also, I needed some bottled water.

Big Difference Number One: We walked.  In Atlanta my husband and I live where we do so that he can walk to work and we can walk to restaurants and theaters and fun things to do.  I take a train to my school and walk to the station in the morning.  But I’d never dreamed of walking to the grocery store.  “It’s OK. The store is very close,” Vicky said. Well, it wasn’t that close.  We had to walk several blocks, cross a street of crazy traffic with no signal, and wind through a narrow alley with little piles of garbage everywhere.  Katie came along, dancing and skipping her way through the bicycles and street vendors.

Big Difference Number Two: When we arrived at the grocery store, it looked like we were going into the back door of a run-down factory.  The huge, boxy building was not marked at all from the outside.  There was no flashy sign. There was no parking lot.  There were no sliding glass doors or grocery carts lined up for us to take.  There were no stacks of circulars with coupons for us to look through and then forget and leave in the bottom of the cart.

Big Difference Number Three: Inside the door was a maze of stalls selling everything from designer impostor handbags, to flowers, to makeup, to “iPads,” to towels.  Apparently we were not actually in the grocery store yet.  It was sort of like we were in a shopping mall that had a grocery store as an anchor tenant, instead of a Macy’s.  To get into the grocery store, we ascended on a huge escalator.  The grocery carts and coupon circulars and all other manner of grocery shopping accouterments were at the top, including the big, flashy “TESCO” sign.

Big Difference Number Three:  It was huge, and I mean huge.  I’ve shopped at some pretty big Publixes in my days, and this blew them all away.  It was like grocery shopping at IKEA.  We rode another conveyer belt up. The first level was all perishable items: meats, fish, bread, dumplings, fruit, dairy, and you-name-it.  On the second level were electronics, small appliances and luggage, and at the very top were dry goods.

Big Difference Number Four: All the time we were there, we were in a hurry. I don’t know why.  Everyone was.  The traffic in the grocery store was as busy and fluid as the traffic on the streets outside.  I prefer to do my shopping at a more leisurely pace, but that felt impossible.  As I was gawking at all of the abundance, other shoppers were pushing past me, moving other people’s carts, and vying for spots in the check-out lines. Sheesh!

Not Any Different: Celebrity endorsements were everywhere.  There were movie, sports, and music stars plastered on everything from dish soap, to coffee.  Life-sized cardboard cutouts of a shapely pop star stood next to a display of soda. Stickers with a clear-skinned ‘tween TV show sensation were stuck on boxes after-school snack cakes.  A video screen showing an older film star enjoying cookies ran on a loop in the bakery section. It was just like home.

Not Any Different, Thank Goodness: I didn’t have to bargain with the clerk upon checkout.  I was worried that I might have to.  I know that many tourists in China enjoy bargaining with vendors to score great deals on souvenirs.  That will not be me.  I have not had to bargain with anyone, and I don’t want to.  I want to do what I did at Tesco yesterday: choose what I want from the shelf, show the items to a clerk, learn the total price, and decide to pay it or not.  Awesome.

On my way out, happily swinging my bag of bottled water, Chinese candy, silly bandz, scour pads, and dish soap, Vicky urged me to try a candy from one of the merchants in the mall section. I’m still not sure what it was, but I liked it. I can’t wait to go grocery shopping again!