Wednesday, May 4, 2011

Tuesday night at Carrefour

Men in suits with tiny children picking up something on the way home, working moms with carts filled to the brim doing the family shopping for the week, a few extended families helping Grandma get her groceries, two little boys excited about their new nintendo game, young people who hadn't grabbed a basket and were carrying a couple of items more than they could handle, a man still in his paint splattered coveralls cooing at his tiny baby in the stroller: Carrefour hypermarket before closing on a Tuesday night. I hate going to the store after a day at work, after the rush to fix dinner. I feel like I'm sleep walking and have to call home three times to be reminded of why I had to go. But observing the other types of people trekking through the aisles made it more interesting.

For some crazy reason I usually do my shopping on Saturday when the whole town is crammed into our little local mall. Super Target and Super Walmart are not originally American inventions. France introduced the concept of hypermarkets 30 years ago. Carrefour is one of the largest chains in the world. Hypermarkets are usually the anchor store of shopping malls. One other tidbit you need to know: Carrefour is closed on Sunday. This is why everyone is bumping carts and fighting over the fresh strawberries on Saturday.