Nobody Lost an Eye

By way of name, nomenclature, or designation, it was called Simply Market. We had seen it from the outside on our walk around the exterior of the commercial complex. 

(That picture, and more can be found here). We used the checkout pictured under the bienvenue sign.

The entrance was guarded by nicely dressed folks handing out green flyers. They weren't going to give me one, but I extended a hand in silent supplication and, unable to resist my boyish good looks and new world charm (there may have been other reasons--but I'm telling this story like I remember it), a woman handed me one of the papers. Apparently they were from a local Catholic charity, and were providing a list of things that were needed which could be purchased for donation to the charity. I thought that would be nice to do. However, under the stress of making our necessary purchases, I soon forgot all about the charitable stuff. 

"Stress?" you say. "What possible stress is involved in a simple trip to the supermarket?"
It wasn't exactly Odysseus in the cyclops' cave (here is a concise synopsis for those who have not discovered the everlasting delight that is The Odyssey). I mean...I don't think that we were in danger of having our brains dashed out and our flesh consumed, and no one lost an eye, but we were there for food and drink, and the exit was defended by a fierce cashier. We were strangers in a strange land.

We looked around at various food items, trying to decide what snacks and things we would need over the next couple days. Then we looked at the shampoo and cleaning products. It was while looking at the hair care products that I was racking my brain, trying to remember the French word for shampoo. It seems like a silly word in English. Where did we get such a word? 

For anyone who cares, the word "shampoo" comes from Hindi and was first used in 1762; but the entry also says that the first known use of shampoo was in 1838--don't know if that refers to the word, or if no one washed their hair until 1838, even though the word had been around since 1762. So we had a word for something, but no one did the action it described, or used the product so named until almost 80 years later? I suppose it's not too difficult to understand. Imagine a bottle of shampoo sent from India to Great Britain, and how it might have been received:
 "I say, Reginald, would you like to give this curious liquid a go? Sir Horace says that it's all the rage in India."
 "What exactly is it, Percival?" 
"According to the note, apparently one puts it in one's hair. Let me read what Sir Horace calls it. It had some peculiar name, I remember. Well...Oh...well, indeed. He says it's...it's... Oh, Dear me! It's some kind of poo!"
"I don't care what they're doing in India. Take it away! Horace always was such a blighter."

After looking at several bottles, I had an epiphany: the French word for shampoo is shampooing. I knew because I saw it written on the bottles. I didn't think that I would've forgotten that...but I had. It was about this time, after we had selected a few necessary products, that I had another epiphany. We didn't have a cart or basket or anything. I remedied the situation by seizing a little contraption that had been abandoned at the self-checkout which was near the hair products. It was a basket on three, wheeled legs. It turned out to be pretty handy. We got some cookies, croissants, grapes, oranges, laundry soap, shampoo, and a few other things that I can't remember at the moment. I got to explain to my wife the prices--the comma used like a decimal point--and the weights--the fruits were sold by the kilo. She didn't seem all that impressed by my explanation. 

When we got near the checkout, I had another epiphany (that was three before lunch time: a new record): In France, you're expected to bring your own grocery bags--we had not. I saw that they did have some plastic bags for 70 centimes a piece (how much for a whole one, it didn't say). I decided that we would just buy one of those for carrying our stuff back to the hotel. 

Perhaps I've created the impression that the cashier was intimidating, fierce, or otherwise cyclopean. If so, I meant that in a purely dramatic and utterly fictitious sense. She was absolutely delightful...until she came to the oranges. She looked at the bag containing the 4 oranges. Then she looked at me, and said, "Didn't you weigh these?" The other fruits had been in containers that gave the weight and price. The oranges, I had placed in the bag and weighed, but hadn't punched the buttons on the computerized scale that would print the price on an adhesive sticker, which I was then supposed to stick to the bag. I had figured that there would be a scale at the checkout and the cashier could do that. Rather than explain all of this, I told her that I had not weighed the oranges. "Would you like to go do that?" She asked with a pleasant smile. Truthfully, I didn't want to do that. That was why I hadn't done it before; I had no idea how to operate the scale to make the printer work. Instead, overjoyed that I was understanding perfectly everything that she was saying, I agreed. I probably would've ran out into traffic if she had suggested it.

I took the oranges back to the scale. Once again, the kindness of strangers came to my rescue. A gentleman who could tell that I didn't have a clue helped me operate the machine to get the sticker. And by "helped me operate" I mean that he made the selections on the touch screen while I watched. I thanked him, and returned to the checkout. 

At the checkout, I found a curious situation. My wife, who speaks no French, was carrying on a conversation with the cashier, who spoke no English. I don't think either of them could tell me what the conversation was about. The cashier asked me if I wanted to buy the bag for 70 centimes. I informed her that we wanted to buy the bag, and we completed the transaction. The cashier was pleasant throughout. My wife did inform me that the old lady in line behind us was not pleasant throughout; when I had gone back to weigh the oranges she had exchanged some words with the cashier in tone that denoted neither patience nor cheer. I felt bad about that,,,because I'm usually the guy behind the people who don't have their act together, and I know how it feels; but I'm pretty sure she made it out without being eaten by the cyclops. So she should be happy about that.