on bagging your own groceries.

it's the little things that make living in another country different, strange, and sometimes stressful. whether its the difficulties recalling just how to do laundry and trying to read the manual in french to remembering to ask whether the store in which you're shopping has a return policy. to bagging your own groceries. in the states, it's your job to put your items on the belt, to take your cash or credit card out and pay away. sometimes you're expected to sign something too. here, there's the added pressure of bagging your groceries, which is actually a lot of pressure because often the sales clerk won't start ringing up the person behind you until you've finished. or (possibly) worse, they will begin ringing, and you'll have to separate your stuff from the person behind you. so while you're still putting your items on the belt, the clerk's already ringing stuff up, but you're not ready to bag! you still have to get your money out! it's especially rough for me since i don't go grocery shopping until i'm really desperate and then i buy so much stuff.