Eating and shopping for food has become an adventure for us. When we first went into our "big" grocery store, we were excited to see several items from home that we were accustomed to. That is until we checked out the prices! Yikes! I will never again complain about the prices back home. Produce, if they have it is high. Apples, oranges and cabbage are all about $2.95 lb, You can also get tiny local bananas (sometimes), yellow onions 1.50 lb, and nice Russett potatoes for $1.50 lb. You get the idea! The other day we wanted to have some loaded baked potatoes so I bought all the fixings, including cheese. Pure gold.... 8 oz block of cheese was $6.60. We will definitely use that sparingly. Of course white rice is plentiful and only $11 for 20 lb. I guess that's why they eat so much of it.
The other thing we discovered is that they don't seem to care about expiration dates! We soon discovered if something is on sale, then it's OLD! Or if it is real EXPENSIVE, they don't put a price on the shelf. We are slowly learning what to buy and what not to buy. I love yogurt and cottage cheese, but will have to do without. Milk comes in quart boxes on the shelf, so that's the only reliable dairy product here, oh, and ice cream. I was craving cottage cheese the other day and checked the date, 5-31-13! Hmmm, don't care to know what that was like. Guess I can do without for 2 years! Check out some of the items below!
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| Froot Loops, $9.35 That I can pass |
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| Saltines? $8.50, pass on that, too! |
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| sometimes you can find some interesting brands, these are soaps. |
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| One of the smaller stores on the island, with familiar products |
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| This is inside one of the 2 restaurants on the island. These are some of the missionaries in our district. We pushed two tables together to seat all of us and it took up about half of the restaurant. I had a delicious grilled tuna w/ rice dish for $7.75. I am starting to think it's almost just as cheap to eat out as it is to cook for yourself! |
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| This is a typical shop along the street, run out of a house |
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| One of the smaller stores. |
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| This was the plate of food we got from our District President's house the night we celebrated his son's leaving on a mission to Hawaii, he fed everyone steak, chicken, hot dogs, rice, noodles, salad, and breadfruit soaked in coconut (my favorite)! |
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| And of course, we have managed to make ourselves at home with our favorite snack - popcorn (we are learning how to make it out of our biggest pot). And to top it off, our favorite game "Ticket To Ride"! |
