Observations in “Super 88”
The Hongkong supermarket, “Super 88”, is located to the west of our campus. It’s a place combines food court and supermarket together. The food and products sold there are mostly from Asian. There are Chinese food, Korean food, Indian food, Thai food and Vietnamese food served in the food court. The food there is cheap, and people can either take away or dine since there are several open tables around the court.
People who go there to have meals are mostly Asian students or professionals, and you could also find some elder people (about 50-60 years old). Some people have meals with one or two friends and some eat alone. Sometimes we can see Western faces, however, they usually come with Asian friends and would like to try the delicious Asian dishes that they haven’t tried before, or if they come by themselves, they must be sincere fans of Asian food. People who dine there are mostly common people (neither wealthy nor of high social status). They dressed causally, no luxuries with them. People who dine there feel free to laugh and chat aloud. They don’t care much about their impressions about other people since everybody does the same there.
The food there is tasty but not delicately prepared as you can find in the French restaurant. Most of the dishes are served in a white foam take-out box (Chinese cuisine), a big bowl (pho/ noodles) or a stone pot (Korean cuisine). There’s a strong mixed smell of various types of food. Fortunately, the smell is not strange or disgusting.
However, the smell of the Super 88 supermarket does disgust me all the time. There’s a nasty smell of raw meat and fish, which never dissipated. There are varieties of food (including frozen food, vegetables and snacks), drinks and ingredients from different parts of Asia, such as Japan, Korea and China. Therefore, consumers are mostly found Asians, especially Chinese people. Besides Chinese, you can see Thais and Koreans as well (but not as many as Chinese). They usually shop with their friends or boy/girlfriends and buy a lot of groceries for home. Since it is a Hongkong Supermarket, the cashiers all can speak Cantonese. They probably come from Hongkong, or some region of Guangdong, (there are probabilities to be Malaysians or Singaporeans as well.) Other helpers (they add goods on the shelves and organize them in the correct order.) in the supermarket looks like people from Mexicans or Philippines since their skin color is brown.