When even shopping is a challenge

I went for a big grocery shop today.

Weather: Warm, minus five and a half. Skies: snowy. Precipitation: Snowing intermittently.

Road surface: Icy with fresh snow.

Clothing: Tights, thick socks. Jeans (long leg ones, bad move), vest, long sleeve top, wool jumper, ski jacket, light hat, light gloves, snow boots.

Mission: To restock the house with fresh fruit and vegetables, canned goods and healthy foods. Low salt, low sugar and no E additives.

Problems: Having learned the words for salt and how much is low and how much is high, am faced with the word Nadium. No idea. Sugar is in everything including wrap breads, I can't find sheep cheese and a lot of canned vegetables are stored in salt water. All the tomatoes contain a E additive to make them look red. Shopping at this rate (translating from both the Swedish and the Finnish) takes some 45 minutes.

I remember to weigh every item but get stuck with the leeks. I am not sure which of the haphazard signs around it are actually for the leeks. That they are French leeks only confuse me more. I also make the mistake of thinking cauliflower is sold by item not by weight but thankfully KM calls me while I am the checkout so everyone knows I am a stupid foreigner by the time the rogue cauliflower makes its appearance.

I buy something that looks like cottage cheese and is. I buy something that I am convinced is organic strawberry yogurt and I later find out is marjat. It's fairly foul, whatever marjat is. It looks like some insipid kids dessert and tastes like one too. It makes my tongue recoil with its sugary sharpness..

I successfully calculated the number of recycled bags to bring with me to get it all home without buying extra bags but I miscalculate how heavy everything will be to actually carry. By the time I've reached my flat, I am heaving and panting, and dying to rip off all the layers of clothes and sink into the sofa with a nice creamy, organic strawberry yoghurt...