A Wall of Mayonnaise

Finally did some shopping at Metro Cash & Carry. Quite an experience. Metro (pronounced "may-trah" by the Russians) is Moscow's version of Costco and Walmart all rolled into one. You need a membership card, it's in a giant warehouse out near the Ikea and a lot of their products are sold in bulk, but then again some are sold individually, which is why it's kind of a combo of those 2 stores. As I have mentioned in the past, grocery shopping in Moscow stresses me out. At Metro however, I actually wasn't stressed out; instead, I was just exhausted. The store is so big, it's a workout just walking from section to section!

The other interesting aspect of shopping at Metro is that the Russians go crazy there, loading up multiple carts with everything but the kitchen sink and then maybe even buying a kitchen sink (since they sell appliances there too)! The amount of consumption occurring at these stores is astounding.

I took some highlight photos. What I didn't manage to capture was someone at the checkout with 2 hugely overloaded carts, because it just would have been too awkward and too "Americanski" of me to whip out my phone to take a photo. As it is, I got some funny looks taking these.

Xmas decorations on steroids

more holiday decor

speaking of steroids....here's the fireworks...new year's is a BIG DEAL in Russia (bigger than xmas really). of course they have a security guy watching the explosives.

One thing that's different from the States, people just leave their carts at the end of the row and walk down the aisle to get what they want. So there appear to be stranded carts everywhere, when really it's just their shopping norm.

Gouda cheese. 965 rubles, which is approximately $30. Holy crap this cheese is made of gold!

The Wall of Mayo! Seriously, 2 out of the 3 sections on this wall were dedicated solely to MAYONNAISE.

Meat locker, aka freezing room stocked full of meat, meat and more meat.

the ubiquitous RECEIPT STAMPING to make the purchases official. you can't see here, but the receipts are printed in triplicate on dot-matrix style printers.

Here's my receipt -- I wasn't kidding about the dot-matrix printing. Note the official STAMP at the bottom. And then, just to be safe, we have the normal receipt too, stapled on top. I didn't even buy that much stuff!

PS Oh and here was my treat for myself for successfully navigating Metro alone: chocolate dipped heart and star-shaped pretzels! Just kidding, not really pretzels. They turned out to be gingerbread cookies dipped in chocolate, SHAPED like hearts, stars AND pretzels. Oh well.