From Kristin Hammett

God has been doing many neat things in the ministry here – and back there too! We are just thankful for the privilege of serving Him after all He’s done for us. But you can read about all that from my husband’s emails. 🙂 Now for a woman’s perspective…

Grocery shopping! It’s always been fascinating to me to see different grocery stores in different cultures. We are blessed in S. Africa to have  modern, nice grocery stores as opposed to an open air market like many 3rd world African countries.

In the produce department, you have your fruit and veggies weighed and tagged right there. They don’t do it at the checkout. Every once in a while, I have an “American Moment” and I put my produce in the cart without being weighed. When I get  to the checkout,  they usually look at me like I’m from another planet – and at that moment – I feel like I am!

Eggs are not refrigerated here. Since many do not have refrigeration, they  say that it is better to never refrigerate an egg at all than to buy them refrigerated and not be able keep them cool when you get home. At first, that was very shocking to me – to see unrefrigerated eggs. Salmonella warnings popped up all over the place in my mind. Most U.S. visitors are usually shocked at this too. It’s actually quite convenient as it saves space in your fridge! Especially when you buy as many eggs as the Wilhites do. 🙂

Potato chips are most often smashed. The reasoning among the shelf-stockers seems to be that you can fit more bags on the shelf if you squash them. Funny how that works.

There are no weekly coupon flyers  in the Sunday paper here. There isn’t even a Sunday paper – but that’s another story. 🙂 Every once in a while there are sales, but it can mean that the product is out of date so you have to be careful. Product refills are very common here.  It’s a great idea and makes so much sense. It is rather unique to see refills  of all sorts of things like dish detergent and milk. Usually it is quite a bit cheaper to buy the refill, but you do have to watch. Sometimes it is the same amount. Sometimes it is more! TIA!

Spices

Baking Powder

Ajax Dish Liquid

Table Salt

Plastic shopping bags are not free. You have to pay for them. So although they are available, most use the reusable shopping bags that you can buy at the checkout. They are very handy reusable bags. They are much less bulky to store at home than a gazillion plastic bags. I even use them to pack food  when we go away to Kruger.

With three kids, my favorite part of grocery shopping here is the trolley (shopping cart) attendants that wait at the exit of the store. It is their job to take your cart and unload it for you. How wonderful is that?  It is customary to tip for this.

On a more personal note, George and I celebrated 9 years of marriage this month. God is so good.  George surprised me with lots of roses, a new outfit, and we also had a special ‘formal’ candlelight dinner as a family. It was very special. Thank you to the Ladies’ group for the anniversary money. We will go out for dinner as a couple in a few months when we have someone to babysit the kids! We also had the privilege of making the 3-hour trip to see our good friends, the Kuzels. While on our way, our brakes starting acting up again. George didn’t feel comfortable driving home with them as they were, so Tuesday morning we got the van in the Kia dealer there. The van never got done till 4pm. So we ended up staying all day – which was fun! It was ordained of the LORD because for an reason unknown to us, they classified it as under warranty at this dealership, where it hasn’t been covered in the past at the dealership in our area. So the Lord just had to bring us  3 hours away to have the R1200 job covered! Praise the Lord!

With love,

Kristin