Monday, March 15, 2010

Walmart, and Target, and Kohls, Oh my!

How does one get used to 20 isles of food when used to 6? Or only needing to shop at one store for groceries as opposed to 4? Or how to properly handle the cashiers who tell you their entire life story when used to a simple "bonjour"? It's not what I would call hard, but it doesn't just snap back easily.

We have lived in France for 10 months. It took about a month and a half to get used to those small stores, walking to and from the stores, going to several stores to get what we needed for the week, and even shopping up to 3 times a week. But we grew to love it!

We went to our first grocery store 2 days after arriving here, and here's what went through my mind. "Wow, this place is massive. We need milk and bananas. Gracious! There are 15 isles in between the two. How funny! Ok, we have the groceries and now to the check out. I think we could get to know this cashier lady and her entire life in the 10 minutes we are standing here. She's so talkative! Oh, there are the grocery bags; but wait, I don't need to sack them. They do all that in America. Strange!"

A couple of days later we had ventured into Wal-Mart and Target. The convenience and prices are great, but the isles of food are still overwhelming. I have to admit that I'm missing my small little grocery stores with only 1 or 2 brands to choose from, the exercise we get walking to and from the stores, and the challenge of making the cashier smile. Needless to say, we will be enjoying and taking plenty of the American groceries back with us and I will definitely enjoy shopping at our super convenient stores with a newborn. But this feeling of missing my stores has made me happy. Happy that God has helped a girl who grew up with the "convenient" to love, and even miss, the "inconvenient."


1 comment:

  1. Your description of the 'massiveness' and all the aisles sounds like that of internationals (mainly Indian and Asian)when they go shopping for the first time in the states. One guy just stood and stared at all the different kinds of cereal and then exclaimed to my husband that he had never seen so much! Glad you guys are enjoying simplicity:)

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