You have heard me speak of my beloved Suguo, our local grocery store. Our Fair City has come a long way in a decade. Friends of our who have been there going on 14 years arrived at a time when there were no grocery stores, only the slightly shady markets, the sort that sell meat quietly rotting on plywood tables, that have been chronicled somewhere in these pages.
Luckily, Suguo arrived before we did and we can purchase milk (with melamine!), reasonably fresh fruits and veg (including the yet-to-be-tasted durian!), sweet bread that tastes vaguely of coconut and that we only feed to the children disguised in a milk/egg mixture that I used to refer to as "French Toast," that is now the Breakfast-That-Shall-Not-Be-Named (for fear of offending some European or another who another who probably calls is something quite lovely and sophisticated), and American Flavored Potato Chips just around the corner!
Anyway, Hope's class was going on a field trip to Suguo and as they were requesting a slew of parents to supervise, I raised my hand. Jeff was a little puzzled by the field trip. "To Suguo? Haven't they all been to Suguo?" Well, I explained, no. No mother enjoys dragging her children to the supermarket. It's a short trip on a bike, but a longer trip if we all have to walk (and I am not shepherding my two children across the our bus infested street on bicycles while balancing groceries; even I am not that blithe). Not to mention that all children wandering the aisles while mom chooses the best bananas and tries to located the least melamine infused yogurt consider the entire exercise torture. So, no, while most of the children had been inside of a Suguo at some point, a field trip with their class would be an adventure for them.
The children were paired up, one adult to two children. This is Hope and her best pal, Iris. Each child was given 10RMB and a "grocery list" from the produce department. They were all buying fruit, with the end result being fruit salad as their afternoon treat.
The way you buy fruit in stores in China is you pop it in a bag in the produce section and then take it to the weighing lady who weighs it and puts a UPC code with your cost on it. Easy, sensible system once you work it out (which most people do pretty quickly, really, it's not that complex). The children each choose their fruit, bagged it, took it to the UPC lady, then hit the registers to pay.
I have to say, the whole thing was *hilarious.* The kids are all 4 and 5 years old and were just entranced with the experience of picking out their own fruit and being all grown up about weighing it and paying for it. Really, a bunch of 4 and 5 year olds all puffed up with their own grownup-ness is just too precious.
And the staff of the Suguo had never, ever in their lives seen anything like this crew strolling through their store. I can't even imagine what they thought we were up to. I assure you that the local Chinese school does not feel the need to do "real life" field trips. Here's the whole gang. Interesting how all the boys look like they are going to fling their fruit at the photographer.
The Durian has been duly sampled. It is kind of creamy in texture, quite sweet...and reminiscent of onions. Old onions. Or garlic. I'm not entirely sure. Definitely an acquired taste, whatever it is. And yes, it is quite aromatic.
Posted by: Emryss | September 13, 2009 at 09:34 PM