Whenever I go grocery shopping I always get just enough food to last for a couple days, mostly because I don’t know what I’m going to want to eat on Thursday if today is Sunday. But when I was growing up, my mother used to take us to the grocery once a week because that was the only time she could go. We stocked the car with bags and bags of treats and stuff, but mom always warned that if me and my sister ate all the fruit snacks or Pops or Pop Tarts or whatever, that was it until the next week.
Grocery shopping — what we buy and where we go — is a rich sociological activity that has a lot to say about our upbringing, our tastes and habits, and our social class. American photojournalist Peter Menzel recently launched a fascinating photo essay on what a week’s worth of groceries looks like around the world. The series is definitely eye-opening, not least because it shows the peculiar dietary habits of people in 20 countries around the world but because it shows how prevalent American food products are, how healthy people eat based on their country, and it really puts First World Privilege in check.
Guess which country is the most unhealthy of the bunch?
The pictures are very telling!
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