Not Too Far from Home

It has been quite a learning experience since we arrived last week.  I am happy to report that we are a lot better at getting around and communicating than we were just 6 days ago.  Our family motto has been "One Step at a Time", and that has proven a great way to ease into the different culture and lifestyle.

The first day we were here, I ventured to the grocery store with the kids on my own...probably not the wisest decision in hindsight, but I was feeling brave.  After figuring out how to get INTO the store, I must've looked like a deer caught in the headlights as we perused the aisles for anything recognizable.  (remind me to tell you about the phrase "something familiar")  Anyway, it is a huge, 2-story store that I eventually realized had a "cart escalator".  Elizabeth informed me that IKEA also has these contraptions, but I hadn't been there, so I was a newbie.  Upstairs is the produce and the perishables.  I bagged a few carrots and apples (they don't have the cute little baby carrots that we love so much, just the gigantic gnarly ones) and realized there was a line in the produce section.  Hmmm... a line... should I be in it?  I watched.  Yep, seems like everyone got their veggies weighed and tagged before moving on.  Good thing I noticed, as the check out lines were downstairs and surely did not weigh any produce.




Along with the unknown, there were many things that I recognized.  L'Oreal shampoo, Coke and Pepsi, Knorr soup mixes, electronics (yes, in the grocery stores - tv's!), and the kids found the toy aisle!  They were so excited to see something familiar.  After we got as much as we could carry back to our place, we utilized my high school spanish skills to check out.  Huge sigh of relief to have some food to put in our fridge!  It felt like a big accomplishment on our first day here.  I was so proud of myself, until a few minutes later...



On our way home from the store, I couldn't find the door to our apartment building.  Once I realized I'd passed it, Elizabeth said, "I think I noticed something familiar back there."  Sure enough, she had seen our door!  Phew, good thing!  So ever since she said that, they have both kind of adopted that phrase.  Yesterday, we were walking and Michael said, "Wait, Mom!  I saw something familiar back there!" It was a bush with red berries on it - really.  You'd have thought he'd seen the Rocky Mountains!  "We have those in Colorado!"  But it has been a fun game to find "something familiar" everywhere we go!  We're closer to home than we think...

Comments

  1. Ha! You sound like me when we first moved to Colorado. Moving makes the mundane, like grocery shopping, an adventure. The lay out was unfamiliar, and though we spoke the same language, communication was different here then back in Texas. The Mountain People have their own "ways." I can't imagine throwing a foreign language into the mix! I hope it's more fun for you then it was for me...

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