Supermarket Tales: Week 1 in China

November 20, 2015

When I was in 8th grade, my parents and I hosted a Russian orphan girl named Alena for two weeks as part of a Russian exchange program to show the kids America. One of the most striking memories I have of Alena was watching her enter Target with us. She stopped right her tracks, her eyes widened, her mouth dropped, and she literally let out a gasping “wow” under her breath. I remember thinking how strange it was that Target could be so impressive to someone. If I could see myself walking into this Chinese supermarket on my own in my first week in China, I imagine I looked exactly like Alena.

I have been around the world this year, traveling through more than a dozen countries, and yet standing in a sea of Chinese people entering a standard grocery store, I felt like a bewildered child staring at the most overwhelming scene.

For one, the noise level was unbelievable. I have never in my life had such a loud grocery shopping experience. It looked like a relatively normal grocery store, but sounded like an expansive outdoor market. At every corner, someone was trying to sell something, as if I had entered an informercial convention depot. The butcher section slammed with knives and butchers yelling to one another down the line of staff. Women dressed like flight-attendants filled each corner of the dairy section, and talked through microphones to get customers to sample yogurts and different milks.

The most overwhelming section was the fruit and veggie area. Staff called out to the customers, while waving their product in the air. I decided to tackle this section first. I grabbed a cart and began to peruse the aisles, avoiding men, women, children, and babies left and right, as well as flying fruit in my face, and screaming Chinese words. I got my five fruit/veggie ingredients and noticed that the process required weighing them and getting a price label from one staff member. However, in order to complete this task, one had to push and shove into a crowd, force their items on the scale before others, and make sure the woman gave them the labels. The poor woman had about nine bags in her face from people trying to get helped. Unlike a Westerner who I imagine would be beyond overwhelmed, annoyed, and become angry, or who may create some organized system to relieve themselves of this situation (such as maybe a line?), the woman calmly grabbed whatever bag waved in her face most aggressively, weighed it and handed it back to the customer, with no problem at all.

At first, I watched this process on the outskirts of the crowd, watching the strategies and laughing to myself on how I was going to succeed in this process. I was polite at first, tiptoeing around, careful not to bump others, and trying to squeeze to the front where the scales were. That got me nowhere. I became more aggressive, pushing more and lunging forward. I kept looking around ready for someone to say “hey, watch it!,” “ow!,” give me a bad look, or shame me for “cutting,” but no one blinked an eye towards me. My behavior blended in, and somehow I emerged from the crowd with my items price tagged.

I continued my chaotic shopping experience. I went on a 15 minute mission for brown sugar. Finally at the brown sugar location, I had a sweet exchange with a Pakistani women who was looking for prunes. When she spoke to me, I blurted out “English!” so relieved to have someone else speak to me in my language. It was a moment of familiarity among so much unfamiliarity. I found my way through the strange aisles. Who knew you could have 300 types of ramen packets in one aisle? My cart was filling up. Then, I turned a corner and saw there was a whole other floor on top of the most massive grocery store! I couldn’t believe it. It was as if Target sat on top of Costco. People were going upstairs on a conveyor belt, and since I saw no one with a cart, I assumed carts were not allowed. So I left my cart near the bottom of the conveyor belt and made my way upstairs.

The same sort of scene was upstairs except with bedding, kitchen, and clothing products. I went to find a frying pan because our apartment’s kitchen was so dirty and limited we had only one filthy pan to cook with. The woman trying to sell the pans knew no English, so we had a funny exchange where she spoke a lot of Chinese and I looked extremely confused and we relieved ourselves with awkward laughter. I did get a pan for $5 though.

Next, I went to the bedding section to find a bottom sheet because the one at our apartment is really a top sheet so it comes undone all the time. Again no one in the section knew a word of English. Trying to explain what a bottom sheet is in mime language is incredibly difficult. They seemed to not know what I was talking about in the slightest bit, so I moved on. I made my way through the top level and then went back down to the first floor.

I returned to where I had left my cart, and suddenly realized it was no longer there. I frantically searched the surrounding area. It was gone. I went to nearby staff and tried to mime that my cart was gone, they shrugged their shoulders and gave me a nearby empty one. I waved it away and tried to explain what had happened again, they didn’t understand. I threw my hands up in the air and took the cart, feeling defeated and wholeheartedly dreading having to retrace my steps, especially in the competitive fruit and veggie section.

I made my way through the store with a lot more ease the second time around. After some time, I finally made it out of the grocery store. I think it was at least a two hour expedition in the grocery store. Instead of being a simple, short errand, my grocery shopping became the center of my day, a challenge, and a thought-provoking experience. When my boyfriend Greg came back to our apartment that day, I was bursting with my story. I never knew I could have so much to say about a grocery store.