"That's right. About ten million people know it's Portugese."
So it may sound juvenile, but one of my greatest traveling pleasures is visiting supermarkets in foreign countries. I have fond memories of the giant cans of deer meat in Finland, the Faggo cookies in Mexico. So naturally when we stopped at a café next to a supermarket in Pico, I insisted we had to go in.
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My travel mates had already done the supermarket gambit back in Faial, but I’d stayed back at the hotel to get some work done instead. It was there that Rob – one of my travel mates – bought proscuitto (yes, I know it’s spelled wrong) flavored Lays potato chips, and Jessica – one of my other travel mates – netted the single most brilliant product ever made. One of the popular brand of condoms in Portugal is called Family. Spermicide is called “retard.” So she bought herself a package of Family with retard. The best part is the couple on the box look so happy about it all. And there’s even flavored Family with retard. Score!
So I wandered the aisles and looked at ice creams I couldn’t eat until I met yogurt with Smarties, which really, defeats the purpose. I mean, sugar is supposed to gnarl your inner chemistry while the good bacteria in yogurt is supposed to clean it up? That makes no sense to me. The chip aisle looked pretty standard, and there wasn’t really anything bizarre in the coffee aisle. Colleen will be happy to know that they had Fitness in a box, but I was disturbed to see that Rice Crispies had been demoted to being called Trio. Apparently Snap, Crackle and Pop don’t deserve separate names anymore, either.
There were Luxury Cookies, confusing canned meats, and Rob found some dishwashing soap called Fairy, which is apparently very popular in the U.K. But I wasn’t overly pleased with this market’s offerings until I walked through the toiletries aisle and discovered Nike roll-on deodorant in a two-pack, with a scent described as “Urban Musk.”
“Is that the smell you get after you play street ball for two hours?” I asked Jessica.
“Maybe that’s the smell you get when you ride the subway without deodorant on,” she said.
“They might as well call it ‘Street Funk,’” I reasoned. “Or why not just be direct and call it, ‘Armpit and Ass’?”
We abandoned our Urban Musk conundrum in favor of drinking Portuguese coffee. The actual scent of Urban Musk remains a mystery for some other intrepid reporter to uncover.
Anyway, I’m now in Sao Miguel, where I’ll be visiting tea plantations, pineapple farms and botanical gardens. We’re about to have dinner at a restaurant that includes honey in many of its recipes. And soon I will be home, long enough to unpack and repack before I hop on another plane…
In short, this month will be full of adventure.
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