The Corn Chip Aisle

 

I arrived in America nearly three weeks ago I’ve been struggling to make the choice as to what to write about. I’ve had too many options.

For example, since achieving my temporary ambition of becoming a mix of house-husband and unemployed layabout, I have been walking on the beach at Cayucos once or twice a day. I have enjoyed the warm and blustery weather, as have the kite surfers and the fellas that zoom about on those kite buggy things. So I was going to write about beach sports but I have too much to learn yet to launch into the topic as if I know something. Perhaps later.

The wildlife has been a topic. For example, the Sherriff posted neon pink signs near all the beach access points this week reporting a shark sighting, and telling people to keep out of the water, which everybody, especially the kite surfers, promptly ignored. There was also what can only be regarded as an incident involving photos of a dead skunk being eaten by a Turkey Vulture, which I posted on Facebook (the photos, not the Vulture, were posted, for those of you allergic to dangling modifiers.) One friend, in an outburst of extraordinarily narrow-minded vitriol, called me a “sicko” and asked if I’d been affected by “the Americans” already. Well, you know who you are, and I’m telling “the Americans” you called them all names. Considering one of this friend’s dearest ambitions is to, as she put it, “rollerblade down Venice beach” you’d think she’d be a bit nicer to “the Americans.” She was just kidding, I’m sure. Personally, I’d pay hard cash to see her try and rollerblade on Venice beach. Perhaps a kite would help.

But there is nothing really HAPPENING to the wildlife here. There is wildlife. What more can you say? There will be an opportunity at some point to write about it and post some nice photos. But not yet. Another potential topic was the hedonistic debauchery of the Santa Maria Strawberry Festival, but I’d missed it by a week. I’d been looking forward to it; perhaps next year.

There were topics aplenty; but none of those which floated around in my head really seemed significant enough to be really gone into in depth as my first blog post from the New World, until several conversations I had had with various people started to string themselves together. Time and time again I had the same conversation with new acquaintances. If I could boil down and distill the essence of these conversations, it would go something like “How are you different to us?” And this question was asked out of enthusiasm and friendly curiosity, out of Americans’ desire to learn about America.

The more I talked about it, the more the topic of this post emerged. Newsflash, it should read, America is a foreign country. English speakers in today’s world might be fooled into thinking they know America, through pop culture and linguistic familiarity. We know they drive on the right here and don’t put a ‘u’ in ‘behavior’. But this, shock horror, is not all there is to it.

For instance, when Stacey’s cousin Tyler talked to me about guns, I did not feel in any way out of my depth. He knew we have gun control laws in the UK, and asked me if I had ever fired a gun, and if not, was it something I intended to do now I was here. Now, I know about the right to bear arms (which is not the same as this) being protected in the Bill of Rights. I know how, love them or not, guns have a place in the past history and present day culture of the United States in a way they don’t have in Britain. It was one of those nice, easy, obvious cross-cultural exchanges which I had already thought about and, although the topic was an emotive and polarising one whose basic principles are deeply rooted in the political philosophy and pragmatic needs of the eighteenth century, Tyler and I knew what we were still able to have a sensible conversation about it.

Contrast, if you will, the far less politically-charged issue of tortilla chips. We needed food, so we went to Albertsons in Morro Bay. In need of a maize-based salsa delivery mechanism, I headed to the snacks aisle to pick up a bag of Doritos.

Culture. Shock.

Instead of finding a supermarket aisle stacked neatly with crisps, cashews, pork scratchings, peanuts, pretzels, Pringles, corn chips, Twiglets, Wotsits, Quavers and Space Raiders, I was confronted with the Corn Chip Aisle. That’s all there was. An entire aisle devoted to salsa delivery technology.

Did I want triangular or round? Yellow, white or blue corn? Scooping or flat? Triangular or round? Salted, slightly salted, plain? Nacho cheese, chipotle, lime or sour cream flavours? Made with canola oil or sunflower oil? Oh, and which brand? I went into psychological meltdown at the overwhelming range of choice. How did I know, when I picked a bag up, it was the one I wanted? Was I sure? Did I not want salted, rather than slightly salted? Was I sure I was sure? I just wanted a bag of tortilla chips…

By the way, the crisps, cashews, pork scratchings, peanuts, pretzels, Pringles, corn chips, Twiglets, Wotsits, Quavers and Space Raiders or their American counterparts all had their own place under the hallowed roof of Albertsons.

The reasons that Albertsons in Morro Bay has a Corn Chip Aisle are at least as complex as gun control. Other Albertsons stores elsewhere in the U.S. will not sell as many different varieties because they serve communities with different needs and expectations. Clearly, Californians expect corn chips, and multitudes thereof. In Britain, we’d have maybe three different producers of corn chips available in a supermarket. Doritos, probably Kettle Chips, probably the supermarket’s own brand. Here, there is an aisle full. Isn’t it ironic that here of all places, a small producer can make a local impact without needing to fight against corporate monoliths? America’s big. There are a lot of people buying tortilla chips. They don’t all buy Doritos.

So what have we learned today, class?   Perhaps, that the thing about culture shock is that you don’t know where it’s going to come from. The obvious is, well, obvious. There are guns in America? No way! You’ll be telling me they drive on the right-hand side of the road next! You can’t tell which of the many and varied layers of history and culture of a foreign place are going to come into play at any one time. Perhaps, that there really is such a thing as blue corn.

Perhaps, that buying biscuits freaked me out nearly as much as buying tortilla chips. Don’t get me started.