Thursday, 15 August 2002 | Food system

Going to the grocery store is altogether different. Not different like in Berlin, where I could still take a car but had to pay a deposit for my shopping cart and purchase the grocery bags. Yesterday was my first major trip C-Town, a cheap Brooklyn supermarket that sells almost everything except for produce. I rode my bike there, picked up some bungie cords so that I could fasten a milk crate just above the back tire, and piled the groceries inside the crate and in my backpack.

The problem came when I went to the produce market. In order to go inside the store, I had to leave my bike unguarded and unlocked, sprouting $50 worth of groceries ready for the taking. So I hurriedly threw bruised top-layer fruits and vegetables into clear plastic baggies, looking behind me like a paranoid shoplifter, watching to see if my groceries and bike were going to find a new home.

It was difficult to navigate the bike with the extra weight on the back—dodging construction, walkers, and cars—and harder still to drag the bike up the stairs. Miraculously, I didn't litter the street with cereal and yogurt containers, and the loaf of bread I bought wasn't at all flattened. I am, however, working out a new system.

By the way, the first day on the new job was a good one.