Yesterday I went with my friend Corinne to the Supermarket to shop glossary and other stuff. It was a very rich intercultural learning activity for me. It’s amazing how much you can learn about a culture from its culinary habits! The Egyptians have a proverb which says “the road to a man’s heart is his stomach”. I would say in this case “the way to a culture’s understanding is its food!”
Alexandria has a huge Carrefour Supermarket on the entrance of the city, but in fact once I went there I noticed that it’s much more than a simple Supermarket! It’s in fact the new downtown of the city. Usually downtown used to be Safia Zaghloul street and Mahatat Erraml area, well, not anymore since the Carrefour opened as if you take any taxi now and tell him take me downtown he will take you to the supermarket! Once you enter Carrefour you will understand why this appellation; in fact on week-ends you will have the feeling that all Alexandria is there. People don’t need to bay anything to go there, they would just meet there for a coffee, a meal or walking with their kids.
I would like to share with you my impressions about the division of space inside the supermarket and how it reveals the Egyptian Culinary habits and the Egyptian culture. First, there is no bread section apart from the baskets of Egyptian bread on the entrance, maybe this can be explained by the fact that Egyptians prefer to bay hot bread every day from Tabour El Eich or the corner glossary shop, or maybe it’s due to the fact that they consume more rice than bread like all Asian countries. The last explanation maybe more plausible as I also noticed how the rice rows are huge to the point we got lost between the different brands of rice that were there. In Morocco and in Europe it’s very different, you will have a lot of bread types and less space for the rice. Second, the rows for milk yogurt and cheese were way smaller than ours and it was impossible to find a good Brie, Camembert or Rockford even if Carrefour is a French brand of supermarkets! This remind me of my friend Marwa when we were last time together in Paris, and how she hates the tasty nice cheese. Yet, the canned Foul, the Homouss, the Halawa, and the Tahina were everywhere you may look, that’s because it’s the main components of a good Egyptian breakfast I guess! Another very important thing is that alcohol is not sold on Supermarkets is Egypt even if it has a big Christian population, which is very strange somehow! Without speaking about the Condoms situation! In fact until recently the only way to have a condom was to go to the pharmacy, and now that is being sold in the supermarket it’s very embarrassing for people to go bay it, according to my friends, one must invent a whole strategy to go bay a condom in the supermarket without being noticed by anyone or feeling ashamed!
I also want to tell you about the ongoing Egyptian Valentine day! Corinne and I noticed that all the house furniture, cups, plates and everything has hearts or was decorated with hearts. First Corinne said it’s maybe celebrating Valentine’s Day before Valentine, but my friend Ahmed Esmat told us that Egyptians are eternal romantics and they love to express it in everything 
Furthermore, in the Supermarket I discovered that amazing organic nature friendly brand called ISIS and I automatically felt in love with it! The quality and the packaging is great and the price is very good, so I thought here is a good move for living healthy and protecting the nature (they are not paying me to say this by the way)!
After 3 full hours in the Supermarket and deep thoughts about the Egyptian shopping habits and culinary preferences it was big time to focus on my own shopping before my friend Ahmed gets really mad at Corinne and I for being very slow and complains about being nicer with us that he is usually with his Mum while shopping!
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