
The best way to tour a city is through its grocery store - nkurz
http://nymag.com/urbanist/article/the-best-tourist-secret-attraction-is-the-grocery-store.html
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tobr
Yes! Walking into a grocery store is one of the best things about traveling.
It is one of the few genuine everyday activities that are easily available to
a tourist, but is going to be quite different to what you’re used to from
home, sometimes in surprising ways.

Hopefully this will not disappear entirely as brands and chains become more
and more homogenized across the world. One of the saddest examples of this is
how nearly every brand of ice cream in Europe became part of Unilever’s ugly
“Heartbrand” in the late ‘90s. Now anywhere you go, you will just be offered
the same Magnum, Solero, Cornetto. Who wants to take a vacation photo eating
an ice cream you could find in your local store at home?

~~~
mixmastamyk
Latin America too. Interestingly, each country has it's own name, often the
name of an old-time ice cream company that has since went out of business. In
the US it is "Good Humor."

Took me a few years during my backpacking days to figure it out. While odd, I
never thought of it as "ugly."

~~~
smcameron
Only parts of the U.S. I've lived in Florida, Arkansas, Mississippi, Texas,
California, and Virginia, and I don't think I've ever had Good Humor. Mostly
Blue Bell.

~~~
ImprovedSilence
I never even knew there was a dominant ice cream brand, and if you asked me to
name it, I would have picked Hersheys. I have lots of different ice cream
options at my grocery store, and some are going the “all natural, 4
ingredient” route as well. Plus it seems like every small town has a
dairy/local ice cream shop it feels like.

~~~
mixmastamyk
Not sure I’ve had the original, but recognized the name, maybe from TV or old
movies:

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Humor](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_Humor)

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands#Ice_...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands#Ice_cream)

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mikeholler
I've been telling friends and family this for years. It's by far my favorite
thing to see in a new city in a region I've never been before. It's sort of
like a modern anthropological exhibit in more ways than any other single city
structure.

There was a photography coffee table book I loved, where the artist took
pictures of an entire family around their table, which had all of the food
they ate for a week on it.

I've since forgotten the name of the book (if anyone knows it please tell me
-- search isn't turning up much), but grocery stores feel like as close as a
regular tourist can get to those personal scenes.

~~~
alteria
The book you're thinking of is probably Hungry Planet[1]

[1][https://menzelphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/Hungry-
Planet-F...](https://menzelphoto.photoshelter.com/gallery/Hungry-Planet-
Family-Food-Portraits/G0000zmgWvU6SiKM/C0000k7JgEHhEq0w)

~~~
mc32
What’s amazing about that is the unnecessary or excessive packaging becomes
evident.

Underdeveloped nations haven’t yet gotten in the bad habit of wrapping
everything in plastic. Grains are in reused sacks, meat is straight from the
butcher. I mean, sure I get egg cases and wrapped meats. But some places put
vegetables and fruits in styropacks.... why?

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egypturnash
I just moved back home to New Orleans after twenty-something years in various
other corners of the US, and seeing the aisle of local products is both
disorienting and familiar. There’s a few brands with pro-looking graphic
design, a few of which have made it out of the state (you can buy Zararain’s
stuff elsewhere, for instance), and a lot of brands you’ve never heard of
outside Louisiana with labels that look designed by the owner’s cousin who has
the Adobe suite.

The stuff with the amateurish labels is inevitably the best. It’s not packed
with preservatives and stretchers and all the other crap you have to
adulterate your food with to be able to ship it across the country and have it
be shelf-stable.

There’s other surprises around the grocery store, but the feeling’s most
intense in the Local Seasonings Aisle at the local Rouse’s.

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PascLeRasc
Spanish grocery stores are incredible, you really get a feel for the tapas
culture. Everyone stops by after work just to get their late afternoon
meal/snack and breakfast for tomorrow. You can't go wrong with any of the <7€
wines, and the salami and cheese selection is superb too.

I was in Kyoto a few months ago, and wandering through the Kyoto Co-op grocery
was super fun. So many kinds of green tea I had never heard of, and again,
there's a sense of the Japanese minimalist cooking culture. Almost no one in
Japan owns an oven, and most places I've seen just have 1-2 standalone
electric burners, so baking either isn't done or it'll be something small in a
toaster oven.

I love grocery shopping in general, but if you're abroad I'd highly recommend
checking out local grocery stores.

~~~
kurthr
If you're in Tokyo (Taito City), go see Kappabashi Dogu-gai or Chef's Street.
It has an amazing collection of cookware, dining sets, chairs, signs, place
mats, cooking knives, and plastic food.

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diablerouge
I'm not in a position to do much traveling right now, but I get my kicks
visiting small foreign markets here in the United States. Some things you
can't get anywhere else, and it's always fun to see what things are considered
Staples for different cultures. For example, I have found that the Russian
markets have the best pickles and bread, and the Vietnamese markets have an
awesome deli and really good produce, and there's a Caribbean market near my
house that carries Ting, which is my favorite grapefruit soda.

~~~
jschwartzi
I buy all my spices from regional markets. There's a Halal market west of my
girlfriend's place which is where I buy my fenugreek and olive oil because his
prices per gallon are very reasonable, and he actually stocks fenugreek unlike
every single other store I've been to in the area. And if I need MSG I go to
the asian market because I can buy it for $2.00/lb.

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qychtkd
Libraries are also a good way to tour a city. Get a transit card from a
grocery store or a convenient store (also a lotto ticket because you never
know).

Start with the main branch, then on to the various neighborhood branches. It’s
important to pick a section you are interested in beforehand. Fiction might be
too overwhelming, so I’d go for the math or computer technology sections.

Once you’ve done this in multiple cities you can compare the sizes of those
sections between different cities and how current the books are, i.e, for tech
books, do they have books on the latest trend in programming languages.

Go to coffee shops and bakeries in between. I can usually squeeze in the main
branch and one or two neighborhood branches in a day. Research the city to
figure out which neighborhood libraries to go.

~~~
rcpt
Cemeteries to

~~~
donarb
Record and book stores as well.

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starky
When people go to China for the first time I always recommend that they go
walk through a Walmart there precisely for the reason that it is a friendly
and familiar place, but also highlights just how different the food culture is
in that country vs. at home. I'm pretty sure it was the only piece of tourism
advise my Chinese colleague gave me when I went for the first time, and I've
passed it on ever since.

~~~
kweks
Yup, bags of live frogs are not what you'd typically expect in a Walmart !

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ryanwaggoner
When I land in a new city, I spend the first day with no plan, just wandering
about. It's surprising how much of a feel you can get for the texture of daily
life in a city by doing this.

From my perspective, food and all the rituals and customs around it are some
of the richest parts of culture, so I also like to go to grocery stores like
this article covers. Another half-day is dedicated to a food tour, which is a
fantastic way to learn about a new culture. In my experience, often the tour
guides have lived in that culture for many years but they're not originally
from there, so they can do cross-cultural translation for you, pointing out
things you might not expect. And the best tours also include walking around
the city and seeing cultural highlights.

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frankus
Shopping for food in grocery stores was one of the highlights of touring
Switzerland in a rented motorhome (for the record Migros > Coop > Aldi IMO).

~~~
etqwzutewzu
Swiss here. Globus > Manor > Coop > Migros. Aldi and Lidl are in Switzerland
too but they are German and Migros > Aldi > Lidl.

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jedimastert
I recall a work trip to a conference in Anaheim (California, US, right outside
of LA but still in the metro area). It was my first real work trip and I was
disappointed because I wasn't seeing very much of Anaheim outside of the more
tourist-y stuff, as the area around the conference center/hotel was one giant
tourist trap. So, I ended up at the local Target at around 9am, and I'm really
glad I did, because I felt like I was seeing a more real part of the city than
the rest of the time combined.

~~~
pishpash
Or take public transit around town.

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dsfyu404ed
When I visit a foreign country I always make sure I go to a junkyard
(preferably a self service one) and buy something. You tend to have very
"authentic" interactions with the locals in that kind of setting. It makes for
great stories that simultaneously allow you to brag to your coworkers about
how "authentic" (or whatever) your tourism experience was while also making
them uncomfortable. 10/10, highly recommend.

~~~
mherdeg
Interesting idea!

I wandered around a thrift store in Bern once and found some weird secondhand
stuff -- mannequins apparently for sale, fur stoles, mattresses, chandeliers,
clocks galore, oil paintings, dress shoes, model trains, china, flasks,
buttons, yarn -- all piled high, priced about 50% of what you might pay in a
retail store (which is still very expensive), and sold in what looked like a
very large single-family house in the middle of a quiet residential
neighborhood that had been somehow emptied out and turned into three rambling
stories of loosely scattered miscellany.

Reviewing the map now, apparently just down the street at 24 Pappelweg there
was an even bigger, more commercialized thrift-store operation, a Barner
Brocki Plus, which might have had what I was actually looking for (a men's
coat). Oops.

At least I got to read the local news and find out that, yes, their version of
the American thrift store is a bit different and a bit pricier (e.g.
[https://www.derbund.ch/bern/stadt/brockenhaeuser-sind-
zwar-s...](https://www.derbund.ch/bern/stadt/brockenhaeuser-sind-zwar-
stubenrein-dafuer-aber-teurer/story/22526852) ), which was an interesting way
to learn a new culture.

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lanrh1836
I would say farmers market even more so than a grocery store, though I usually
do both.

Ironically I also love going to foreign McDonalds. Always fun to see what
local items they have.

~~~
davidw
> foreign McDonalds. Always fun to see what local items they have.

That's a good point. It's funny for Americans to see beer there, in, say,
Europe.

~~~
umvi
It's also weird to see lots of "vices" (beer, cigarettes, condoms, etc) in
vending machines on the street. Like, when I was in Italy I saw kids buying
beer and cigarettes and no one seemed to care!

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Scoundreller
Look around the supermarket too.

In France, a bakery can thrive next to a supermarket because enough people
mistrust the supermarket's quality.

In N. America, a supermarket opening is a death sentence for nearby food
vendors.

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ImaCake
If you are interested in more genuine experiences in the countries you visit I
recommend learning at least 100 words in the local language. It's a pretty low
bar, but it will take you a long way! Some of my most memorable holiday
moments have been over some fumbled german or trying to build a sentence out
of my very limited Japanese vocab.

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Causality1
To answer the mystery from the first paragraph the author leaves hanging, the
avocado in question was probably a B-cultivar, either Florida avocado, Fuerte
avocado, or Monroe avocado.

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fhbdukfrh
As a kid the differences between Canadian and American grocery stores was
amazing. Especially chocolate bars.

Not so different anymore, aside from the prevalence of corn based sweeteners.

~~~
qychtkd
You still can’t get Mr. Big in American grocery stores.

~~~
fbelzile
Or Kinder Surprise eggs [0]. No problems going to Walmart to pick up a firearm
though...

[0] [https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-
drink/feat...](https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-
drink/features/why-are-kinder-surprise-eggs-illegal-in-the-usa-10055273.html)

~~~
cm2012
My local grocery store (New York City) has lots of kinder eggs always. So do
some local corner stores.

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rootsudo
I'm glad I'm not alone in this! you can tell so much from a grocery store, and
it's something I always do. People commented that It's odd, but nothing is
better than local selection and too many people really value "experience" over
price.

I don't care if you can get the same item from the company in it's fancy
downtown store, or a few blocks away at the grocery store. It don't really
matter and becomes a tourist trap.

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archy_
Sadly, this doesn't apply to America. Our grocery stores are very much
homogenized, and in many parts of the country the only grocery store will be
Walmart. Urban areas will have higher end chains that stock a wider variety
and some foreign and independent stores with unique selections, but once you
get past the cities and into rural America, your options for groceries are
about the same from town to town.

~~~
quicklime
I've been making it a point to visit grocery stores in every country I visit
for the last 10 years. I tend to agree with you that grocery stores tend
become homogenized within a country (and not just in the US), but there's
always a lot of variation between countries.

You'll probably find this strange, but as a foreigner, I was really excited to
see Walmart for the first time, and I found it just as interesting as visiting
grocery stores in other countries.

There are things there that just seem comically American - like there's a
McDonald's inside a supermarket! And there's a section where you can pick up
guns and ammo while you're buying milk and eggs!

The chocolates section contains the same products as every other store across
North America, but I'd never seen any of these while growing up in Australia,
so we picked up a lot of these. Even basic things like bread taste different
from back home.

Other stores are interesting in different ways. The size and scale of Costco
is insane. Whole Foods and Trader Joe's carry different brands of everything,
so it feels very different shopping there.

I'm really looking forward to my next visit to the States, and picking up the
bacon flavored popcorn from Trader Joe's. I've never seen this anywhere else
in the world, and it's as awesome as it sounds :)

~~~
Scoundreller
> And there's a section where you can pick up guns and ammo while you're
> buying milk and eggs!

Please please, this is impossible in America. The guns aren't in the fridge!

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js2
It seemed like when I was in Italy I was the only American who knew not to
look for eggs in the refrigerator.

But that didn't help me when a cashier got impatient with me for not having
weighed my produce in advance. Who knew?

~~~
forinti
In Colombia I found it (very!) strange that meat was not displayed in a
refrigerator.

I've never seen eggs being sold from refrigerators though.

~~~
js2
In the U.S. eggs are washed and refrigerated. You find them at the back of the
grocery near the dairy. (Unless you get them at s farmers market or roadside
stand.)

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Scoundreller
When I do this, I inevitably have to explain each decision to my hosts:

> “Why did you buy this cheese?”

It was obviously a pricing error, there’s no way a hunk of real cheese only
costs 2 EUR

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m3kw9
Foreign grocery stores are definitely a under appreciated tourist spot. Just
see Japan for example, it blows me away with lots of wtf moments

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kqr
I can imagine this is great for people who don't have deadly food allergies.
For me, navigating foreign grocery stores has become so filled with anxiety,
doubly so in a country where you don't know the language.

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jedberg
Whenever I'm in a new country or region, I always make a point to go to the
grocery store and the McDonalds. Both tend to have unique items that you can't
find anywhere else.

~~~
tootie
Vegetarian McDonald's in India was certainly different but it was also kinda
gross.

~~~
9nGQluzmnq3M
I recently tried a KFC in Bangalore. Deep-fried chickpea fritters in spicy
biryani rice is a pretty long way from what the Colonel started out with.

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Scoundreller
Was surprised in France to find out Kronenbourge comes in a plain formula. I
thought 1664 was all it ever came in.

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kidsil
I've been saying that for years!

Every single new country I visit, the first thing I check is the local
supermarket.

