Globalization or Bust

I made the mistake of going to IKEA today. From the second I stepped through the sliding doors and was whisked up the elevator, I could have been anywhere in the world. For free, I had taken a trip to a country within a country. You can visit the same place in San Francisco, New York, London, Paris, İzmir. It's the same damn thing everywhere. I don't know why, but I find it creepy and disconcerting that millions of people unwittingly have the same living room.

The other day I was reading a new book--The Girl Who Played With Fire by Steig Larsson [which I HIGHLY recommend after you read the first, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo]--and the main character (in Sweden) furnishes her new apartment entirely from IKEA. Larsson inventories her purchases and some of the consonant-laden item names rang bells (Lak, Billy, etc etc.). If that's not sick, I don't know what is. And remember IKEA in Fight Club? That was already years ago...

In America, IKEA is not particularly haute couture. It's nice enough, and it can be expensive, but it won't break the bank. Some things in Turkish IKEA are cheap bargains, but others are freaking pricey. From the designer purses and convincing dye jobs I witnessed on the women eating in IKEA's cafeteria, my opinion of the socioeconomic bracket shopping there solidified.

As if that weren't depressing enough, I wandered across the massive parking lot and paid a visit to Kipa. I wanted to see if they had any specialty import foods I couldn't get in my neighborhood. If Kipa were in America, it would be like Safeway or Fred Meyer or Giant Eagle or some grocery store chain like that. Here, there are mini Kipas (maybe twice the size of my living room) in neighborhoods, and then there are mega Kipas (in which an entire camp of refugees could be housed).

I hadn't been in a store this big in ages. Shopping in İzmir is usually a crowded, hustled experience. In mega Kipa, however, space opens up around you. Aisles are wide enough to drive a car down, the brightly-painted warehouse ceiling soars stories above your head. Is this what America is like? I tried to remember. I think so. It was surreal--Walmart-worthy. Why are stores this big? Everything was there: the bakery, the fish counter, a land of dairy products, freezer cases seemingly stretching for ages. Children played on carts in the open spaces. Where's the merry-go-round?! I wondered cynically. I shuffled up and down the aisles, overwhelmed by the size. I felt like a slow, hobbling, ancient woman who had long grown comfortable with a crowd, but was suddenly thrust into a grotesquely huge _____. **I still can't think of a noun...**

What was ultimately strange, though, was my slow realization that other than the size, this Kipa was inherently Turkish. But it was trying, it seemed, to be more. I encountered a wall of juice and then noticed the pattern of 150-odd identical juice boxes. It's all peach, I realized. I started looking around, comparing it to my mini Kipa close to home. Everything was the same here, there was just more of it.

Imagine going to buy juice and looking at a wall of Cranberry Oceanspray. You want juice, ok, there's Cranberry Oceanspray. You can pick from the top, the middle, the bottom shelf, from here or from further on, but it's all the same.

I floated to the soda aisle. It boasted four different kinds of soda: Coca Cola, Pepsi, orange (Fanta or Yedigün, the Turkish brand), and Sprite. That's it. You want soda in İzmir, pick from one of those. But the aisle stretched just as long as a normal American store, but Coca Cola twelve wide, four high and god-knows-how-many-deep lined the shelves. Rootbeer? Mr. Pibb? Its competitor Dr. Pepper? Mountain Dew? Some Turkish-created flavor that is only available here--maybe made from local ingredients? Nope, nope and nope.

The beer aisle was like the juice wall: Efes, Efes or Efes. The pasta and bean aisles offered more choice simply because pasta comes in different shapes and beans in different colors. The cereal aisle plunged me into dispair again. Cereal isn't very popular here, and I supressed a cynical laugh when I saw the NesFit boxes lining the shelf: Seven wide, one deep. A bizarre, Hollywood facade of food. Or like seeing the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain. I don't know which metaphor fits more closely...

I found some imported Barilla tortellini I'd been looking for, and picked up some scotch tape and a plant pot all in the same place. Despite the absurd obesity of the store, there was hardly anything new that I haven't already seen in some other little store. It was fascinating. And depressing.

Moral of the story #1: Once you've seen a Turkish supermarket, you've seen them all. The massive, mind-blowing variety that exists in America (yes, I dream about the ice-cream and beer aisles) is simply absent in Turkey (although they would give our cookie aisle a run for its money). I don't know if this is a good thing or a bad thing. I've been forever spoiled by The Land of Plenty. Can I learn to be content with less?

Moral of the story #2: To be determined... I don't yet understand this strange feeling enough to articulate it beyond this stupid rant. I feel guilty even writing about this. As though I'm exposing a stain that should only be known to people living over here. But here I am, gossiping about something they're probably proud of. *sigh*