Posts
Shopping on a Saturday at Carrefour is like shopping at Walmart on Black Friday. It's crowded. People are shoving and pushing. There is a shortage of carts. And the line for anything that requires customer service is about 10 deep. I would choose other stores at different days and times, but because I don't have a car and I don't get home before 6 on most evenings, that leaves me and the other 10,000 people in my neighborhood (I'm not exaggerating here on the number, that's really how big this neighborhood of high rise apartments is...) visiting Carrefour on a Saturday afternoon.
Everything about today's trip, however, was especially annoying. Here's the run down:
1. It took three tries to find a cart that would accept my lira and actually release it from the pack.
2. While waiting in line for my fish to be weighed, someone took my cart. It was filled with those little items that have been on my list for several weeks, tricky things to find like shampoo without built-in conditioner and a nail file, and I was dreading another trip across the "Super Walmart" type store to find them. I know for a fact I took the last nail file.
3. Regarding #2 - I shouldn't even call it waiting in line because there aren't lines here in Turkey. It's more like watching people not even notice that I exist and have been holding my fish up to the scale for over 10 minutes and then jump in front of me totally unaware and get served...actually it's the total lack of awareness of other people in general that is getting on my nerves...
4. The fish monger pretend not to understand when I asked him to filet (fileto) my fish..probably because mine was a lone bugger and everyone else was buying kilos....so now I get to use my sorry excuse of a Turkish knife and try to filet (fileto) the dang thing at home...
5. I watched a lady check loaves of fresh bakery bread by pulling each loaf completely out of the paper wrapper and then squeezing the loaf at the bottom to make sure it was crusty enough..I watched her check at least three loaves this way and then put them back. I guess none met her specifications. At that point, none met mine either but for different reasons.
6. I was rammed from behind by an errant boy (most of them are...errant, that is...) In all fairness, his mom did try to apologize for him but by then said youngster was on to ramming the next person.
7. The lady behind me in the check out line, before I had even been told the final amount, jumped up to be next to me totally invading my personal space, hovering over my wallet and standing between me and the checker. She then proceeded to bag my remaining 3 items. Then she asked if those items were mine. (What the @#$%!.... I had so many snide replies floating through my head at this point, but they were in English and totally ineffective so I tried to give my "Are you really this stupid or were you born this way?" kind of look.) I don't know, maybe she was trying to be helpful.
8. Then I got home...and then isn't related to the store but it is kind of...because the washing machine was still running. I'd purposely started in before I left for the store but I guess 2 hours is not enough time to complete the task.
So it's Saturday afternoon and I'm thinking about the concept by Jimmy Buffet..."It's 5 o'clock somewhere."....
Everything about today's trip, however, was especially annoying. Here's the run down:
1. It took three tries to find a cart that would accept my lira and actually release it from the pack.
2. While waiting in line for my fish to be weighed, someone took my cart. It was filled with those little items that have been on my list for several weeks, tricky things to find like shampoo without built-in conditioner and a nail file, and I was dreading another trip across the "Super Walmart" type store to find them. I know for a fact I took the last nail file.
3. Regarding #2 - I shouldn't even call it waiting in line because there aren't lines here in Turkey. It's more like watching people not even notice that I exist and have been holding my fish up to the scale for over 10 minutes and then jump in front of me totally unaware and get served...actually it's the total lack of awareness of other people in general that is getting on my nerves...
4. The fish monger pretend not to understand when I asked him to filet (fileto) my fish..probably because mine was a lone bugger and everyone else was buying kilos....so now I get to use my sorry excuse of a Turkish knife and try to filet (fileto) the dang thing at home...
5. I watched a lady check loaves of fresh bakery bread by pulling each loaf completely out of the paper wrapper and then squeezing the loaf at the bottom to make sure it was crusty enough..I watched her check at least three loaves this way and then put them back. I guess none met her specifications. At that point, none met mine either but for different reasons.
6. I was rammed from behind by an errant boy (most of them are...errant, that is...) In all fairness, his mom did try to apologize for him but by then said youngster was on to ramming the next person.
7. The lady behind me in the check out line, before I had even been told the final amount, jumped up to be next to me totally invading my personal space, hovering over my wallet and standing between me and the checker. She then proceeded to bag my remaining 3 items. Then she asked if those items were mine. (What the @#$%!.... I had so many snide replies floating through my head at this point, but they were in English and totally ineffective so I tried to give my "Are you really this stupid or were you born this way?" kind of look.) I don't know, maybe she was trying to be helpful.
8. Then I got home...and then isn't related to the store but it is kind of...because the washing machine was still running. I'd purposely started in before I left for the store but I guess 2 hours is not enough time to complete the task.
So it's Saturday afternoon and I'm thinking about the concept by Jimmy Buffet..."It's 5 o'clock somewhere."....
No comments:
Post a Comment