Expat Joys - The Neighborhood Shopping Center

Valley Shopping Centre in Dainfern, Johannesburg

Shopping doesn't typically come to mind as a particular joy for an expat. On the contrary, having to find your new favorite places, hunting for certain foods your new host country doesn't seem to manufacture, and in general spending way too much time on errands you had down pat in your previous life, is one of the more stressful parts of becoming an expat. Okay, I admit, I am not a shopping aficionado. That is why until now you haven't found a post on shopping yet on my blog.

But once you've gotten to know your new home, you will discover shopping joys previously unknown to you. For me, that joy is the presence of little neighborhood shopping centers (I am torn whether to spell it "center" or "centre" as my audience seems to be divided just about equally between South Africa and the USA, with a sprinkling of UK and the rest of the world) all over Johannesburg. Every neighborhood comes with its own shopping center. They're typically not very big, yet include all the necessities, from grocery store to cafe, dry cleaning, pet store, hairdresser, post office, gym, video rental, and restaurant.

I've come to love our own Valley Shopping Centre, right at the confluence of Dainfern College and a number of different neighborhoods. It's so close people go shopping there with their golf carts. At the beginning it was a life saver for me, when buying a car took a little longer than anticipated and I could walk up there and buy food, toting my bags like my grandma did in the olden days in Germany. There is something special about buying food on foot that I can't quite explain. Makes you feel more alive, and less rushed - of course, because it's impossible to rush with two heavy bags on either side.

Having to get your mail at a PO Box admittedly can't be called an actual joy, but at
least they are conveniently located in almost every neighborhood shopping center

At first I had the ambition of replicating my U.S.-based lifestyle and getting back into the same routine as quickly as possible. I had plans of making a Macro (the South African equivalent to Walmart or Sam's Club) run every few weeks to stock up on big bulk items and hit a large grocery store once a week for the rest. But our rather small refrigerator and the fact that South African milk only lasts a few days (probably due it being spiked with less preservatives) quickly made me reconsider. Also, why subject yourself to Joburg Traffic if you can avoid it? Any savings the big discount stores might offer (as a matter of fact, Macro doesn't even do that) are easily countered by not having to crawl through traffic for hours to realize them.

In fact, that is one lesson most expats learn (or should learn): Embrace the luxuries of expat life, because you will surely miss them later and regret not taking advantage of them more. I vividly remember Richard from our life in Singapore. Richard showed up the day after we had moved into our townhouse in Holland Grove View. Did we want to order any groceries? He had come with a little delivery truck and an order pad, and we soon learned that this kind of service was very common in Singapore. Suspicious as I was, I only haltingly came to use his services, and only when I couldn't get to Cold Storage that day. In my mind, Richard's service was so convenient that it was bound to be way too expensive, his only marginally higher prices notwithstanding. Instead, I'd wedge Jabulani's infant carrier into the car and thread my around three stories worth of winding ramp in the supermarket's garage, where tell-tale paint marks on the walls bore witness of prior unsuccessful attempts to get through unscathed, only to find out that the container shipment of Nutella was still somewhere on the high seas. Richard, on the other hand, always found everything. And delivered it right to our door. Why didn't I outsource all my shopping to Richard? I have no idea.

Here in South Africa I now happily do most of my grocery shopping at Woolworths one minute from our house in the Valley Shopping Centre. (Click here for a review of grocery shopping in Joburg). I meet my friends for coffee at Cafe Frappe, the kids get movies at Chaplin's Video, we get our mail at the PO box there (if indeed we DO get our mail), we have the occasional dinner at Johnny's, and I get my hair cut at Fashion Squared. There is also a gym offering shadow boxing, two ATMs, a spa, a toy store, and even a sushi restaurant (though I have to admit that one looks a bit suspicious).