The weekend is here, and that means the family gathers at home. Before the pack arrives, it's time to go out and buy some things to prepare the weekend family meals (or, in other words, feed the beasts).
In your country, how do you go about buying things?
Maybe you go to the corner store and get what you need in less than 20 minutes. If you need more stuff, do you make the trip to your favorite supermarket? Or do you go to the nearest farmers' market and get everything sorted out in less than half a morning, at most.
In Cuba, the beautiful island in the Caribbean and supposedly agricultural, it's not quite like that. Let me tell you about the "Operation Vegetables."
"Operation Vegetables" is nothing more than finding the best agricultural products of the day to complete the list that mom gives us.
We do this operation almost every weekend. On Saturday morning, my dad and I wake up really early, and we already have a list with the priorities to buy.
This is the nearest agromarket to my house
To successfully accomplish the operation, we've divided it into two parts: First, we take a little walk through the neighborhood agromarkets, check mom's list, see what we can cross off and what we can't. We rarely buy because the quality of the products on offer is usually not great.
My country is currently facing a massive crisis, both economic and food-related, which often results in empty or poorly stocked agromarkets with low-quality products.
As u can see, it doesn't have many customers fue the limited supply (check the next image of their offers)
Peanuts, chili peppers, garlic and onions, none of them were top quality, and even though the prices aren't the best but they have the best prices in the neighborgood
Since that happens a lot, here comes the second part of the operation: going to more distant places in search of what we need. In this part, we often visit privately operated agromarkets, where the prices are much higher than what an average family can afford, but sometimes it's necessary to make these sacrifices (not so much for a different experience but for our health)
"Where there's a need, there's a business," right? In this crisis, agricultural suppliers have found a way to bring their products from the fields to the hands of buyers. Thus, the emergence of these agromarkets or occasional sellers (it's not an official name, but I had to call them something). These sellers usually come on specific days (mostly towards the end of the week), they set up in a randomly chosen corner or a neighborhood park, and display their products.
These sellers are known for offering better deals than the other options mentioned before (with prices around the average) and higher quality. This is our preferred way of buying in my family.
A stall of an occasional seller
Behind, you can see the truck where they bring the merchandise straight from the fields
Sometimes, it feels like a lottery; you don't know what you're going to find. In the distance, you see a group of people, and you imagine it's an occasional sale. You approach to see if they have anything you need. You notice that they have fresh and good-quality products, and before you know it, you've already bought one or two things that weren't on your list.
My family's preference for this buying method is so strong that my dad already has the numbers of several of these sellers and calls them in advance to find out what they'll bring.
Another occasional seller, this time on an electric tricycle. This is our favorite because they bring goog deals, come regulary, and hace competitive prices, not to mention their delicious tamales.
On this occasion, the selection was quite limited: green onions , tamales, lettuce and spinach (other times they have a bigger variety) This seller isn't the producer, they are more like the messenger , wich is why he has fewer offers than the previous one where they were the producers themselves
Luckily, by midday, we've already managed to get the vegetables and root vegetables, but what about fiber? The main course?
Here, we don't have many freedoms. Food is rationed (once a month, you receive a module with certain food items, which is not enough to feed any family for a month). So, we are obliged to buy from private sellers at exorbitant prices. In my family, we rarely buy from these places because the prices are outrageous. We have to resort to the most common way of buying food: the black market. This mainly revolves around buying and selling groups on platforms like WhatsApp and Telegram.
The showcase of one of the private mini stores, as you can see is well stocked but the prices are too high (that's why they don't have many customers)
My mom spends a big chunk of her time keeping tabs on these groups to snag the best food deals. So, we're out there "hunting" for chicken whether it's 9 PM or 8 AM.
That's how we roll in my fam when it comes to weekly shopping. It's a little teamwork and a whole lotta patience to score those sweet deals. It's a real pain in the rear, and it keeps getting worse every darn day, but hey, I ain't here to whine. So, spill the beans, how do you handle your weekly shopping? Any hiccups at your trusted supermarket? Go ahead and shoot, I'm always up for a chat.
