The Coronavirus Shopping Spree

Having followed the shocking events in Wuhan with such bizarre interest, I felt strangely prepared when the Coronavirus hit Italy. I never thought I'd be worrying about food and face masks or writing a diary about daily life and quarantines, but this seems to be the new Dolce Vita in Italia. 

Reaching the mainland on Sunday, February 23 I had one thing on my mind......getting groceries before everyone else woke up.  Three years ago it would have been impossible.  No grocery stores were open on Sunday.  Whenever I asked, "Is the grocery store open today?" I got the same answer, "Why would it be?  It's Sunday."  This time when I asked, the answer was, "I hope so." 

I never use a cart when I grocery shop.  One of the little plastic pully-baskets is all I ever need.  But this time I inserted my euro for one of the family-sized shopping carts you pick up in the parking lot. And I wasn't even sure one would be enough. Just what do you buy when you don't really know what's happening?  All I could think of were the photos I'd seen of Wuhan on lockdown.  And the closed grocery stores.  And the ghost towns.  And I wondered if I was about to enter the same situation.

I told myself that fresh produce wasn't safe.  Who had put it on the shelves?  I didn't even trust bags of lettuce.  I checked to see what towns they came from and wondered how close they were to the ones that were already locked down.  I decided cans were the safest and had the longest shelf life in case we continued following in China's footsteps (more than a month.)  I bought lots of rice and lots of pasta, but I'm embarrassed to tell you just how much.  Three bottles of olive oil seemed like enough. My cart was filled with toilet paper and papertowels.  I couldn't find little bottles of handsanitizer....that had already been sold out.  So I went to the first aid section and bought five bottles of the stuff you put on fresh cuts to kill the bacteria.  I bought 5 colorful bottles of pink alcohol to sterilize surfaces that needed sterilizing, lots of envelopes of soup like Mrs. Grass' boxes with the bouillon cube, and three huge bags of individualized packs of soda crackers.  I was afraid the bakeries would close and crackers seemed like a good substitute.  The two giant bags of potatoes made me think of photos during the war that I've seen in museums and films.  In addition to no hand sanitizer, there were also no masks.  That's proof that even though I was the only one filling up a cart with groceries on Sunday morning, I wasn't the only one planning ahead.

The cashiers had unmasked smiles and gloveless hands, but I wondered how long that would last. I, on the other hand, was bundled up with my high collared coat and favorite mittens (which I put in the laundry basket as soon as I got home).

I felt good about the shopping.  The only thing missing was the masks.  And I wasn't sure I'd ever use them, but they felt like a security blanket.  We were sure they were probably sold out everywhere, but on the drive home I had a good idea. In Italy we don't have "Dollar Stores".  There is a similar type of shop that sells similar cheap things but they aren't all a dollar, or should I say, a euro. These stores don't have a real name that anyone remembers.  There's one called Ina Market and another called Mia Market.  But if I told someone to go to Mia Market they wouldn't know what I was talking about.  Here the stores are called "I Cinesi".....The Chinese.  So to specify the place you just say, "I found it at The Chinese in Bassano."

I don't think that's offensive to the Chinese people that own them, but I'm actually not sure.  It sounds offensive to me, but no one whispers when they say it. So, on the way home I suggested looking for masks at The Chinese. It's the only place the Italians have been afraid to enter in the past month. I'm not sure if they were afraid of the Chinese products or the Chinese owners, but there was no shortage on masks so I bought 30.