Tag: Shopping

On Women, Shoes and Shopping

It matters not a jot if you been coerced or volunteered every man knows the sinking feeling when you have agreed to go shopping with your wife, girlfriend or partner. You may be there to show your love; you may be there as a penance that allows you to watch a football match or have a night out with your mates, but shared clothes shopping is feared by every man. Every man knows what to expect and it is never great.

There can be fun in shared grocery shopping as I get to push the trolley, and can both drop in things I want to cook and remove the items I don’t like. If Sainsburys, Asda or the Kiev supermarkets wonder why there is a packet of pork pies resting among the washing powder, now they know.

When I shop, I know what I want, and I know where I will buy it. I used to drive into London for the New Year’s Day, Jermyn Street shirt sales. The whole trip could take less than two hours and I would have bought all the shirts I needed for the next year. That is efficient and financially effective shopping.

Men, as a generality, know what they want to buy and go to the one shop that sells it.

It is different for women but before continuing I need a variant of a common legal disclaimer. There it might read: Unless the context otherwise clearly indicates, words used in the singular include the plural, the plural includes the singular, and the neuter gender includes the masculine and the feminine.

Modified mine says: Unless the context otherwise clearly indicates, words used in the singular include all women and Sasha means Sasha, Annie, Lucinda and any woman I have known, and the neuter gender excludes the masculine.

Sasha knows I hate shopping. Don’t get me wrong, I love being with her, but I can’t stand walking aimlessly from shop to shop, standing there, often draped in her coat and handbag while she picks up and holds dresses and coats. I can’t explain why. Maybe it is the apparent aimlessness or the fear of the later discussion I will have to have with the bank.

I know it is perverse because being asked to be the arbiter, even if I am finally overlooked, between the red and the beige trousers is touching.

But, I am not alone, and I can see the look on the face of other men and occasionally we nod to each other in that knowing way before being pulled back to the reason Sasha has me there.

If shopping for clothes is painful it is nothing compared to shopping for shoes.

I have never understood the fascination women have for shoes. Imelda Marcos was reputed to have owned 3,000 pairs although she always said it was only 1,060. If you exclude trainers and rugby boots, which together comprise a significant part of my all-time shoe collection, I doubt I have ever owned more than 100 pairs of shoes.

There is no satisfaction any man can gain from shopping with a woman for shoes. All you can do is sit there dreaming of all the other places you could be. It is just a process of sitting,  nodding occasionally and find the credit card when demanded.

Never try saying anything like but you have a pair like that already. It doesn’t matter and won’t change anything but only lead to a public rebuke. There is never a distinction between AND or OR. It is always AND.

You may not remember this from 2012 when Daniel Shak, sued his ex-wife Beth, for 35 per cent of her $1 million collection of footwear comprising a gobsmacking 1,200 pairs – including 700 Christian Louboutins, with their distinctive red soles. (That last bit was in the article I read. I had no idea that any shoes had distinctive red soles.)

So, who will tell me what it is about women and shoes?

It is a universal desire and love affair that few men will ever understand. I was going to say that Sasha, Annie or Lucinda will no doubt tell me if I ask, but they won’t. As always, as if we were out shopping, I will get that disdainful look and be told to suffer it.

Kiev Day 5: The Supermarket

One of the truest ways to understand a society is to watch them shop. Just as in the UK it is no use going to Regents Street because that is nearly only tourists and so it’s the same in Kiev. There are many Malls and if for example, you go to Ocean Plaza there all the big international brands. That is probably why Sasha always takes both me and my credit card there. One of us all always takes a beating.

No, where you need to go is to the local supermarket where you can watch everyday folk about their business. In the supermarket, there are no pretensions. There is just a job to be done and so it was yesterday when Sasha and I went food shopping.

It wasn’t a mega market nor was it a corner shop, but just an ordinary medium-sized local, busy supermarket with the normal mix of hardened and determined shoppers with both super-sized baskets and the faster racing in after work for evening essentials.  We were somewhere in between who didn’t need much but slowed by my insistence to visit its every corner.

Mother always told to take off my hat indoors and so my sense of etiquette had me remove my insulated woolly hat and pop it into the pockets of my Barbour jacket, but I was the odd one out among fur coats and a wide range of hat styles. The message was clear. When it is cold outside you keep your head warm at all times.

As a passing observation, I noted that while in the UK there is a strong movement against women wearing natural fur there is none of that here. The furs are everywhere. I am not an expert, but sables and minks had better watch out and it leaves me conflicted. I understand the reasons we don’t want clothes made of natural furs but when you see how beautiful and warming they are there is a moment of indecision.

I had a chance to wander around rather than push the trolley. I may be good at many things, or my family might say just a few things, but Sasha quickly decided that pushing the trolley is not my forte. Maybe it was the way I meandered away to look down other aisles and never be next to her when she wanted to place purchased items that ultimately determined my demotion from a simple job.

Anyone who is a regular supermarket shopper would recognise the layout. No sooner in and you are faced with the fruit and vegetables. While Sasha chooses a selection of grapefruit I noticed the quality. There were no pre-packaged selections. Everything was loose just as in an old-style greengrocer but unlike my UK experience, all the produce was handled carefully. My etiquette might have been removing for my hat but for everyone else, the etiquette was to handle the fruit and vegetables carefully to avoid bruising the fruit for later shoppers. There was a love of the food.

My next calling was to the large display of dried fruits and nuts. For me this was special. My current diet is long on the dried fruit and a major source of protein is peanuts. To be able to buy them loose was a treat. There are scoops and plastic bags and I piled in large quantities of high-quality product. For someone who pays £3.50 in Sainsburys for their large bags of peanuts to find that these were both nearly a fifth of the price and healthier with lower salt levels, left me wondering why Sainsburys couldn’t do the same. They were so good I sealed, weighed and priced my first selection and then collected a smaller portion which I ate as we shopped presenting a priced but empty bag at the check-out.

Sasha was still at the fruits while I went to look at the meat both fresh and cooked. Just as it was with the fruit there was an extensive range which was all beautifully butchered and presented. With all the charcuterie on display, it was a great standalone boucherie. So, it was with the bread, rolls, cakes, croissant and cheese. All was individually cut to order and served from an extensive choice.

This wasn’t a scientific piece of research but just a wandering around, but I did find my granola with summer fruits, kiwi yoghurt, cranberry juice, and oats.

I don’t have a deep understanding of UK prices other than everyone telling me that they are always going up. But I can say that the things I did buy were a lot, lot cheaper. I am always wary of these statistics, but one website tells me that Kiev is 326th out of 338 most expensive cities to live in, in the world. That sounds unlikely but those with more information might ogle at:

Milk (regular), (1 litre)

Loaf of Fresh White Bread (500g)

Eggs (regular) (12)

Apples (1kg)

Banana (1kg)

Potato (1kg)

£0.49

£0.24

£0.68

£0.45

£0.75

£0.20

I am not going to draw deep conclusions about Ukrainians from such a trivial survey. This wasn’t a super special supermarket. It was just the local shop, but prices are not the issue, it is the quality that counts.

Kiev is undoubtedly one of the richer areas in Ukraine but even here the average income is still much less than $10,000 each year. Price has to be an issue, but Ukrainian shoppers must demand quality because quality is everywhere.

Conclusion? Let me put it this way. If this supermarket was in the UK it would be my store of choice and the everyday fur just adds a special glamour.