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A small local shop
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I thought I was being quite revolutionary carrying a
shopping list with me whenever I did my weekly shopping here in Algeria, but
little did I realise that this would, one day, jump up and bite me on my
derriere. My husband has become
accustomed to me and my infernal lists, but it’s only in recent months that my
eldest son, at 21, has been introduced to their wonders. After a couple of shopping trips after which
we’ve had the following type of conversation ‘What on earth is ‘Tam?’ (Jam) and ‘That IS NOT an ‘S!!!!!’, he started to
become familiar with my own inimitable style of writing (the results of a hen
walking across a piece of paper after scratching in the dirt kind of describes
it fairly accurately), and so I could confidently send him off into the wide
world of….local shops and markets in the certain confidence that he would
return with everything I requested.
If you know anything at all about Algerian men then it’s
that they do very little on their own…..they always have to have someone with
them whether it’s to fix something, go somewhere, or perform any kind of task
at all. So it didn’t surprise me when my
son roped in his friend to go shopping with him. Then the other day he casually mentioned that
his friend asked him what ‘ris’ was, and he told him it was ‘rice’. When I asked him why his friend asked this
peculiar question, he casually said ‘oh because he was reading your shopping
list when we did the shopping’. And then
he added ‘he was at one end of the shop and I was at the other and he had to
shout it to me’. Then he went on to
explain their shopping strategy: His
friend looks at the list and says ‘what’s sweetcorn? ah, ok, ‘Maizena!‘ Next he sees ‘tuna’
no problem, ‘thon’ but when he gets to ‘chicken pate’ he’s
wondering what’s this new kind of pastry (it isn’t, it should read ‘pâté’….it’s
chicken type salami). ‘Toilet paper?
Ah, of course, Papier de Toilette’ but then he was flummoxed by ‘ Kitchen
Paper’. My son explained with his
hands….toilet paper is this size and then Kitchen paper is twice the size. All this in full view and earshot of the
shopkeeper and other customers. In the
market it’s no problem as so many vegetables such as potatoes, onions, carrots
are all similar to the French, until they get towards the end. ‘What is this?’ and my son replies ‘Peppers’. ‘That’s not a ‘P!’ Great.
So now, the whole world and his mother knows that my writing is
appalling…..in addition to his friend actually reading it. When my face had faded slightly from puce to
pink, I asked him why his friend was reading the shopping list in the first
place, he told me that he wanted to, that he actually enjoyed reading it and it
made shopping fun! This is what happens
when you let two Algerian 21 year old young men loose with a shopping list.
Now my disclaimer…..I did learn to
write…..properly…..honest. But years of
typing away on a keyboard has made my writing deteriorate to a woeful
level. And that’s my excuse….and I’m
sticking to it. I would type out the
shopping list except I know I would then take all the fun out of shopping for
my son and his friend, and when that happens….I’d end up having to do the
shopping myself. So I’m off to do
something I thought I had left behind a long time ago in primary school…..practise
my writing.
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| A small local shop |
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