Days of Yore: Shopping

 "SA-PA-TOOOOOOS! SIYAY!" "BALUUUUUUT!"

These and more were a regular sound living in the Philippines. Street vendors pushed carts or carried their wares and shouted out what they were selling. If the musical Oliver! were reset in the Philippines, I imagine the above calls, along with others, would start out the song "Who Will Buy?" (For the record, the above calls translate to "Shoes! Shine!" and, well...I'll just say that balut is surprisingly delicious, considering how it looks and sounds when described. I think I'll go with "hard-boiled eggs on steroids." I would put a full description of it on a level with Scandinavian lutefisk, though the two dishes are nothing alike, aside from involving meat.)

Sari-Sari Store
Photo by Free2barredo
CC BY-SA 4.0 license

Then there were the sari-sari stores. They were neighborhood convenience stores, usually built into the ground floor of a family home. Our next-door neighbors at one house had one. They sold snacks and a bunch of other things. Many of them had fresh, steaming pandesal, or Philippine rolls topped with bread crumbs. Those are some of my favorite rolls in existence, right up there with Hawaiian rolls. Most sari-sari stores have a window where the customer asks the cashier for what they want, and then the cashier gets it and the customer pays for it. If they weren't next door, they were usually within walking distance.

Grocery stores in the Philippines were similar to the ones in the US, and some of my distaste for pop music was formed by the songs over the loudspeaker at grocery stores in the '80s... If I hear "Eternal Flame" by the Bangles (we changed the lyrics to "Do you feel insane?"), "Miss You Like Crazy" by Natalie Cole ("You're driving me craaazy!"), "Nothing's Gonna Change My Love for You" by George Benson, and others, one more time... Nothing against the talented singers, but I got sick of those songs that I heard over and over in the grocery stores. And now I have those songs going through my head. I have nobody to blame but myself.

They had markets where they sold produce, meat, and other things. Those markets smelled fishy. There were markets where you could buy souvenirs. We had sukis, or vendors that we would visit regularly when we needed the specific wares they sold, and we would get to know them. They often gave us great discounts as we became friends. Bargaining is an art form in the Philippines, and it was a unit in Tagalog class in school. We generally started the bargaining in English, and they would come down a bit, but they would only go so far when speaking English. Then we would switch to Tagalog. They were often surprised, and more willing to bargain further. 

National Bookstore was a large chain in the Philippines, and one of my favorite places to go, as reading filled up most of my spare time when I wasn't grounded from reading. 😀 We had a shopping mall called Greenhills where we often went. They also had some great restaurants. As malls got more popular, Robinson's opened all over the place. It's a chain of malls, like Carrefour in France and elsewhere. (In fact, I recently found out that Tum Nak Thai, the restaurant we visited in Bangkok and the largest restaurant in the world at the time, is gone, and they now have a Carrefour and a Robinson's in its place. One single restaurant was replaced by two malls.) I remember Robinson's Galleria in Manila. I have heard that they have continued to open more and larger malls in the Philippines since we left in 1991.

Coming to the US, we found grocery stores were similar. Safeway, Albertson's, Fred Meyer and QFC were everywhere in the Seattle area. (Fred Meyer and QFC are currently owned by Kroger. When I visited Utah last year, I went to Smith's, which I had never heard of, and they honored my Fred Meyer rewards card because they are also owned by Kroger.) Albertson's is now owned by Safeway, so many of the Albertson's in the area have converted to Safeway. There a few Wal-marts in the area.

There were video stores all over the place. Blockbuster was one of the largest chains. When DVDs replaced VHS, they adapted. Eventually, with Netflix and others, they were unable to compete and have mostly closed. There is only one Blockbuster left, in Oregon. Many grocery stores and electronics stores (such as Best Buy), and some surviving bookstores such as Barnes & Noble, still sell DVDs and Blu-Rays.

We had multiple malls in the Seattle area. Alderwood Mall in Lynnwood and Bell Square in Bellevue were huge. Northgate Mall in North Seattle was smaller, and was the oldest shopping mall in the US. Everett Mall in Everett was somewhere around the same size as Northgate. My grandparents used to walk there all the time. Totem Lake Mall in Kirkland was one of the smallest malls I've been to. There were others around as well. Of those, Totem Lake Mall was the first to close. For a long time, there was only one store left in the mall, and it was sad walking down the dark hallways with almost all the stores closed and nobody there. When the movie Warm Bodies came out (which involves zombies, for those who haven't seen it...basically Romeo & Juliet in reverse), I thought that mall would be a perfect place to film a sequel. It's gone now, with new developments in its place. More recently, Northgate Mall is mostly gone, replaced by a hockey rink and transit station. Last I knew, there were a few stores left, but it isn't really a mall any more. The other malls listed above are still there, but they have undergone a lot of changes over the years.

As the internet got more popular, I made more friends around the world. I was surprised to hear my friends in the Southeastern US talking about shopping buggies, as they are clearly called shopping carts. They have carts in the Philippines. They have carts in the Northwest US. They have carts in the Midwest and Southwest. They are called carts just about everywhere I had been. I had no idea people in other English-speaking regions called them something different! (Granted, they are called trolleys in the UK, if I remember right.) I always associated buggies with horse-drawn carriages.

There were several bookstore chains, such as Barnes & Noble, Borders, Waldenbooks and others. Waldenbooks and Borders have since closed. With Kindle and other electronic means of reading and listening to books, as well as the convenience of ordering online, the demand for brick-and-mortar bookstores has decreased considerably. (I had forgotten about Waldenbooks until I watched Stranger Things recently, streaming on Netflix.)

Online merchants got more common. Amazon has been one of the largest and most enduring. There are also others, such as eBay.

Speaking of online merchants, guess what? I don't do most of my shopping at the brick-and-mortar stores any more! I do shop at them sometimes, but lately I've increasingly used...I hope you're sitting down for this...my cell phone! Many things are much more convenient to order on Amazon and other online merchants. Since COVID, I've done a lot of my grocery shopping on the Instacart app and had it delivered. I am finding more and more that shopping on Instacart also helps me to avoid the annoying habit of groceries I didn't need "magically" jumping into my cart off the shelf and making me spend money I didn't need to spend. I can blame the groceries in question because they are inanimate and can't defend themselves. 

Many stores have pickup options, which we have also used. You order and pay on the app, then drive to the store, and someone brings the groceries out to your car. (They have a part of the parking lot dedicated to this option, and you can tell them on the app which parking spot you are using.)

Shopping has changed a lot over the years. I can't speak for the Philippines, as I was last there in the '90s, but I have heard there have been a lot of changes there too. As far as I know, they still have sari-sari stores and malls and all the other stores mentioned above (at least, those mentioned in the part about the Philippines).

Generosity and Advocacy

In late 2001, the world was still reeling from 9/11. I had a temporary position in September, which ended sometime after that. As finding a job has never been a particularly simple task, I was wondering if I needed to take more classes to gain more skills. I had majored in French at Seattle Pacific University, but without a skill to go with it, there's only so much you can do with a language degree. (Don't get me wrong, I'm very thankful I took French, and it has come in useful! I have endeavored to keep it up in more recent years.) One day as I was leaving our local WorkSource, the local state-run centers where we can go to get assistance with the job search, someone was at the door handing out flyers for Business Computer Training Institute (BCTI). This intrigued me, as I have enjoyed computers, going back to the 80s, and most corporate fields involve computer knowledge to some degree. I looked into it and enrolled. The first half of the program involved studying computer programs, such as Word, Excel, Access and others, as well as skills in interacting with customers and colleagues, learning to train others, research, business letters, and more. I was recognized as Student of the Month at one point. The second half of the program involved the more technical aspects of computers, such as learning about the inner workings of the computer, as well as HTML and basic graphic design (just enough graphic design to get a taste of it and realize I loved it, but not enough to get a job in it...I would return to school in 2011 to get more in-depth design training). 

During my time at BCTI, I formed new friendships. That was also when I had a terrifying experience driving into the sun. But that's another story. Back to the friendships. The particularly memorable ones for me were Ofa, Belinda, Cliff, Michelle and Josh. I'm still in contact with most of them to some extent (or back in contact). I completed my studies there in 2003. In 2005, the school abruptly shut down, taking everyone by surprise. Students and employees arrived for work and class, and the doors were locked. It was a blow to everyone, current students and alumni alike. Many of us have mixed feelings about having gone there due to the nature of its abrupt closing, but personally, I am thankful for the skills I learned and the friends I met who have challenged me to be a better person.

Picture used with permission

One such friend was Belinda. She and Ofa hung out together. When we finished the first half of the program, Ofa made a Hawaiian shell necklace for me. At least for a while, I lost track of most of them (though not all). With the advent of Facebook and other social media a few years later, I got back in contact with some of them. I maintained contact with Michelle and Josh. In more recent years, I got back in contact with Belinda over Facebook. By this time, she had several children. I also got back in contact with Cliff after she reconnected us. She has always been one of the kindest people I have known, but she has had a difficult life. She has taught me a lot about kindness and patience in the face of racism and other forms of bigotry. I admire her advocacy and huge heart for racial minorities, LGBT and other marginalized communities. With her Asian and Latina heritage, she has experienced racism against both groups. She has actively worked with several organizations to provide food and other important stuff for many people who need it. She is one of my heroes.

A couple years ago, I posted a prayer request on Facebook because I was trying to get to sleep, and sleep wasn't coming. I was getting a bit desperate because I needed to be alert the following day. By posting, I was only asking for prayer and good thoughts. But Belinda messaged me and asked if I would like some tea to help me sleep. I was touched by the gesture. She ordered some from Amazon Fresh for me. In order to get up to their minimum, she also ordered other groceries that would be useful. They showed up on our doorstep the following day. I was overwhelmed. I have been able to return the favor a couple times since then.

Due to the COVID pandemic, Belinda's upcoming wedding would be in her backyard with only a few in attendance, and broadcast live on Facebook. I was invited to attend virtually, which I felt honored to do. I watched online and toasted the happiness of Belinda and her new husband:

Belinda also introduced me to a new friend named Michelle (different Michelle from the one mentioned above), who has a similar huge heart for assisting and advocating for others. She is also an amazing cook, and I have bought sweet potato pie from her two years running, for Thanksgiving. She also makes fantastic pumpkin bread. If you need either of those and live in the area, I highly recommend talking to her. 😀

It's people like Belinda who make the world a better place. She is a constant encouragement to everyone around her. She has had a very difficult life, but she has overcome many obstacles to enrich the lives of everyone she knows.