Beijing Supermarkets

No matter if you are in need of daily consumer goods or you're just interested to see how supermarkets in China are different from the ones you're used to, you won't have trouble finding them. If you travel to Beijing you'll find many international chain supermarkets, like Carrefour, Wal-mart, Metro or Merry Mart, just like in any other big city in the world. Smaller supermarkets can be found in almost every corner of the city and if you book one of the Beijing hotels there will certainly be several of them in the vicinity. The smaller ones might be slightly more expensive than the big ones but still very convenient if you don't need much. When you walk into the supermarket building you'll pass numerous stands or little shops where you can buy shoes, bags, flowers, jewelry and you'll pass those again on your way out. Also, in front on the supermarkets are usually vendors selling fruit, DVDs and other things. So in general it's more than just the supermarket itself where you have the opportunity to buy things. Inside the market you can find nearly anything. There is not only a huge amount of food but also clothes, electronic household appliances, household goods etc. There is a large variety of products that most people from Europe or America have probably never seen or bought before. Anyone who's open to new things should give it a try and go for some unknown products like the various snacks that come in little packages for example. Especially in the bakery section there is not much you can do wrong, even if you can't read any ingredients, and there are many tasty things to find. On the other hand, a lot looks familiar because many products from other countries have become quite popular here and international brands can be found as well, no matter if they offer soft drinks, laundry detergent or special kinds of sweets. Some international brands even print the ingredients in Chinese and in English, although you really have to look for it. A very interesting section is the fresh fruit and vegetable section which offers both known and unknown products. Things like lotus root, palm hearts or okra that are hard to find and very expensive in other places are common products here. The general rule about the price is that everything you buy from the open boxes is cheaper than buying it already wrapped in a package. For example eggs are cheaper if you chose them from the big boxes and pay per pound. The friendly supermarket staff will hand you a bag and you choose how much you want. Then you just need to hand it back to them to have it weighed and get a price tag for it. It works the same way in other sections of the market, such as the bakery and the vegetable section, and for many products like flour, rice, beans etc. Products that are not common in Asian nutrition, like cheese for example, are hard to find and rather expensive. Once you've found what you were looking for you might need some patience to get through the check-out. Nobody seems to be in a rush even if the lines are long and especially afternoons and evenings are usually pretty crowded and so are the weekends. If you're planning to go on one of the China Tours it's also interesting to see the local differences and you can compare the regional products and try some different food. from China Travel Blog http://blog.chinatraveldepot.com

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