A slow season, to reflect & collect energy
What might the new year hold? A minute to pause and look at both plans and habits brings up: more slow travel, not to mention lingering over slow food, and on every market day, slow shopping. What…slow shopping? It has been almost a month since I pushed a cart around in a super market, rushing around to find things in aisles lined with hundreds of cereal boxes and buying temptations I don’t really need; then waiting in line. Not only was the experience (and the musak) exasperating, it drove me away.
During the last half of December, I found whatever we needed in the village where we live, with two of each…bakeries, groceries, butcher shops, and a drugstore for toiletries. No need to back the car out of the garage and drive (count time and gas). Shopping locally is not only an opportunity for contact with neighbors, but I can find whatever I need here, and be back at our gate more quickly than the drive to Carrefour or LeClerc supermarkets would allow. So, to continue my “new habits” and do what I can to shop locally, 2010 is the year of no supermarket madness. It will just take a little timing, going to the butcher when they open at 3:00 there’s no one else around when I try to pronounce Herring (my bête noire!), and to the grocer on Wednesday afternoon when fresh produce is in place. Thursday morning market day means fresh eggs, maybe a chicken and a cyclamen for the windowsill, fresh fish and…oh, the cheese. Actually, this also fits into a fitness plan for aerobics when I haul the bag and basket back up the hill. The only real slow aspect about village shopping is running into friends, but that makes shopping a pleasure!
It’s a bit daunting to shop local in France, I have found. Places like LeClerc and Carrefour (which reminds me a bit of Whole Foods Market) allow for some anonymity. And they see a lot of tourists, I suspect, so no one is likely correct improper grammar. Still, shopping local is more fulfilling, more charming and ultimately more satisfying!
January 9th, 2010 | #
Thanks for your comment, Mimi! A good share of my motivation to keep shopping simple and local arises from the recently opened Carrefour hyper-marché just minutes away on the road to Bergerac, and seeing local grocers struggle to stay afloat. So, not only is doing my rounds in the village actually quicker, but hopefully having our business encourages them. By the way, the Roquefort bridge on your site enticed me to add a wedge to my basket this week!
January 9th, 2010 | #
Shopping at the market in France is not shopping but an essential part of one’s weekly social diary. As one strolls through the market one meets friends and spends time finding out how they are and what they are doing. These things cannot and should not be rushed.
Choosing food from the stalls is a pleasure and buying from local producers who might have just harvested what’s on their stall. The shops have a festive air about them. Jean-Paul, the boucher, jokes with customers whilst his father, and former owner, extols the quality of the beef which he has personally chosen from a nearby farm – ‘excellent, superbe’ he tells all the customers – no need for a French English translation here.
Finally coffee in one’s favourite bar with some friends to put the world to rights rounds off a most pleasurable and rewarding morning.
Who cares if one’s grammar or pronunciation is corrected. Indeed if we were not corrected then we would never learn – and it’s free and sociable.
The supermarket is for those things which are essential but which give one no pleasure in buying. Could anyone ever get excited buying toilet paper or washing powder?
January 22nd, 2010 | #
Martin – I totally agree about the “free and sociable” aspects of shopping in village shops, and I never dreamed that saying “herring” in French would be a good ice-breaker, everyone helps and we have a good laugh. Watching the exchange, whether in the market or shops (c’est “Extra”, ce Camembert!) is not only entertaining, but an on-going French lesson. So, see you at the café after rounds in the Lalinde market?
January 23rd, 2010 | #