This little piggy went to the market

I've been thinking that I want to try a new approach to grocery shopping. You see, up until this point, I have had the great ambition of making it to the supermarket once a week and buying enough food for 2-3 people (until a week ago, my cousin was living with us for the past year). What's so complicated about that, you say? Well, the thing is, we don't exactly have a car, and the supermarket was not exactly within walking distance of where we lived. And actually, until a couple of months ago, all we had were bikes. Fortunately, my bike had a basket on the front (I say had because it recently got stolen - boo) and I actually took great pride in facing and meeting the challenge of trying to buy everything our household of 2 grown men and myself needed for an entire week...and biking it 20 minutes home.

How in the world did I do that, you say? Well I developed a system you see. At first, simply figuring out how much I should buy was a challenge in and of itself because the entire time I was nervous that I would check-out, pay for everything, and realize I had no way to get it all home. It was a constant guessing game. How much could I fit in my basket? How much could I fit in my backpack? How much could I try to somehow strap to the back of my bike using bungee cords and this metal bar clamp on the back rack? And even if I did manage to strap it all back there, would stuff fall out of the open bags they were in on the ride home?

For the first six months of life in this country, I was only buying for myself and Bryan - and even that was a challenge. For awhile, I was making TWO trips to get everything we needed because I couldn't fit it all on my bike in one trip. Trip #1: The real supermarket (20 minute bike ride away) - where I had to get everything that closer by markets didn't have, and then some...juice, milk, yogurt, meat, toilet paper, paper towels, cleaning supplies, toiletries - basically everything except for fruits & veggies. Which leads to Trip #2: The fruit & veggie ladies (a short bike ride away, very near our house) - where I would try to estimate how much to get so that it would last a week, but not get too much so it wouldn't go bad.


By the time my cousin arrived, I thought I had a pretty good system down...and then I had to figure out how to fit food/supplies for another whole person, who by the way, can hold his own when eating a meal. But never fear - amazing grocery shopping bike woman is here! By the time last spring rolled around, I was pushing the limits in every way. I completely stopped worrying that I wouldn't be able to fit stuff, and just assumed I would find a way to make it work - and I did! The pic to the left was of me before I started getting ambitious and was still making two separate trips. In more recent months I had about twice as much stuff if not more on my bike.

I used to rotate what I would buy and try to find a rhythm so I was never buying everything we needed in one trip. Toilet paper this week, paper towels next week, shampoo and floor cleaner and other heavy liquids the week after. But by the end, I wasn't even doing this. I was getting bold. And perhaps a bit cocky. I had it down to a science. I knew exactly how many cartons of juice, milk, and other liquids I could fit into my basket. (Gotta make sure all the heavy stuff that would kill my shoulders if I loaded them into my backpack, and awkward shaped stuff that wouldn't fare well being strapped to the back of the bike, made it into the basket - so there you go, all liquids, in the basket). I even started buying veggies - once I realized I could get 'organic' (never can be sure, but it makes me feel better) at the supermarket - and loading all the meat and veggies and toiletries into my backpack. All the 'lighter' stuff like snacks and paper towels would go in bags that I began to hang from the metal clamp thing on my back rack - forget those bungee cords, by hanging I could bring 4 times as much stuff home. And the 2nd trip? I tossed that out too and enlisted Bryan to make a trip to get fruit on his way home once a week.

I remember the moment of true victory in all of this crazy grocery shopping business. I was wheeling out my cart to the bike parking lot, where the attendant (an older local woman - who you pay less than 5 cents to watch your bike and make sure no one steals it) proceeded to tell me that I was insane and that there was absolutely no way I was going to fit my overflowing cart full of stuff on my bike and make it home. She kept telling me over and over that I had bought way too much, and that it would never fit. At this point, I looked her square in the eye and said triumphantly, "Oh yes I can, I do it every week!" She then proceeded to watch me as I loaded and fit everything quite neatly and precisely onto the bike, got on, and biked away. And then she said it, the crown jewel of all comments from grumpy old local women who never fail to hold back their opinion on what you should or should not do: she told me I was "Zhen bang!" - which means I was basically totally awesome. That comment right there made my day, and confirmed that I had mastered the biking groceries home challenge.

And so, with all that being said, you might be wondering why on earth I would want to change the system once I've mastered it? Well, you see, it's still pretty cumbersome to bike such a heavy load home and not truly be able to stop when random walkers and other bikers who pay no attention to their surroundings swerve into your path. Once you get balanced and started peddling, you don't want to stop, trust me. It's just easier for everyone that way. It's also darn heavy and my shoulders are starting to ache just thinking about it. It also takes a looong time. And the ironic thing is that I used to do this in the interest of time, thinking that I would save time by doing it all one time a week so I wouldn't have to go to the store everyday (as the locals do) if I needed something.

But the cost to getting it all once a week was not just the trip home. It was trying to fit it all in our teeny tiny little fridge. It was not knowing how many times we'd be home for meals that week, and having to balance having enough around the house that we wouldn't go hungry with throwing out a bunch of stuff that had gone bad - or else try to salvage and still eat the wilting veggies. It was trying to plan when in my week I actually had enough time and energy to embark on this whole ordeal. And so, the point of this very long and wordy blog - I've decided to follow the locals' way of life (and am also inspired by my friend from NYC who lives here and thinks the concept of buying more than you can carry a short walk home is more foreign than living in another country).

First of all, with our household now having only two adults, that somewhat simplifies things already. Secondly, at our new apartment there is actually a market right outside our complex that has almost everything we would need, from meat to paper towels (items I previously could only buy a 20 minute bike ride away). And so my new plan is to buy fresh veggies and maybe even meat each day when I know I'll be cooking dinner, pick up fruit in small amounts when we need it instead of loading up, and then making one trip a week (or when we need it) to the bigger supermarket to get a *few* things like milk and yogurt that we can't get at the store downstairs and perhaps other things like meat that are cheaper there. Basically my motto is, minimize what we have in the fridge and the cabinets, stop loading up, and actually eat what we buy. This cuts down on cumbersome bike rides home, wasting food, and also helps us enjoy fresh produce each day. And somehow that makes me feel like life is simpler. Will it be? I'm not sure, but we've been doing it for the past week and it's been great so far. I'll let you know.