au revoir.
As I sat down to start pounding the keys and produce the words, I thought maybe this wouldn't be a post about death. “Ha, a short little entry about my life here and how things change, that'll be a novel effort for me.” But the more I thought about what I wanted to say, I realized it's still about death. In a way.
Maybe that's just how things go, though. Maybe anything can be contorted into being about death, depending on how deep one is willing to dive into subtext.
Or maybe it's just me.
This entry is about a store. Can a store die? Perhaps, but it's not even like this store is closing or anything like that. It's just changing names. At least, officially, that's all that is changing. But...
I have somewhat deliberately avoided sharing too many specific details about where on this planet I'm even located, although I think I have mentioned that I do not reside in my country of citizenship. I feel like the word “expatriate” often carries a lot of baggage with it that I'd rather keep distance from. But in the purest sense, the dictionary definition, “a person living in a foreign country” is a descriptor I cannot deny.
It wouldn't be too hard for an internet sleuth to figure out where I now live based on what I'm writing here, if anyone in the world were actually inclined. I don't think anyone will actually ever read this, much less try and dox me. But I'm reluctant to even share this little slice of my life, so apologies that you've had to slog through several paragraphs now of me trying to rationalize it to myself.
Anyhow, when I first visited here, almost eighteen years ago to the day (good lord), it was quite overwhelming. Everyone probably says something like this when they first experience a place radically different than their home, so nothing new, I know. But even in 2008, which doesn't feel super ancient or anything, it wasn't yet like the current era where smartphones and mobile data are ubiquitous. I didn't have a GPS-enabled device, it was still very possible to actually get truly lost within the confines of civilization, and around every corner there was the potential to run into something you'd never expect.
So, on the second or third day in the country, just bumbling around with my then-girlfriend and her brother, I first encountered this store. It was a name unfamiliar to me. The entrance was at street level, and it didn't give me much of an impression. We had to ride an escalator down into the basement of the building, which revealed a much larger store.
I asked my girlfriend, “What kind of place is this?” Trying to explain to a wide-eyed tourist, she compared it to Walmart. Her brother, who had spent a lot more time than her abroad, scoffed. “It's definitely not as big as a Walmart. Nothing is as big as a Walmart.”
Experience would prove her brother to be correct, at least in my opinion. This place was certainly no Walmart, not that I was looking for a Walmart anyway. I didn't buy anything at the store at that time, in fact I don't know if I ever did buy anything from that branch on that trip.
But five months later, in the midst of an economic slump and with zero job prospects, I packed up and moved here. “For a year or maybe two, tops,” I said. I ended up in a totally different city than the first visit. The small bits of familiarity that I had built up from the summer were wiped completely clean. But as chance would have it, my new apartment was within walking distance of another one of these stores.
I ended up finding out it was a European chain. Again, unable to hold a candle to Walmart, but maybe that was a good thing. It was big but not too big. It had everything I needed and, I will admit, had just enough touches of home that it helped stave off homesickness in those first few months and even years.
As time went on, I became a member. I guess I shopped enough there to become a VIP, which is just meaningless marketing nonsense, but still. I wasn't even aware of it, until one time a temporary holiday checkout cashier, perhaps not fully trained in politeness, said, “Whoa, you're a VIP.” And I kind of chuckled, “yeah, I guess I shop here a bit.”
“You have to spend a lot of money here to be a VIP, not just a bit,” she said.
The years went by, and one day there was news that the parent company was looking to exit the market here. Their local partner bought out their stake, and the writing was on the walls. Everyone knew that, at some point, the stores would no longer bear the same name or logo. The stores would eventually become something else. That day, as it turns out, is tomorrow, July first.
Today was the last day for me to visit my old favorite store with its classic signage. To be honest, long before the local company made the announcement about the name change, the feeling was already perceptible. They stopped carrying some of the goods from back home, overall product selection changed, I dunno, maybe just some of the magic was gone. Local products are good, don't get me wrong. But there were already “local” stores I could and did shop at. It's not that this place was an imported goods shop, either. It was still 98% domestic stuff, but there was just a vibe that set it apart.
The kind of vibe that could cause siblings to debate whether or not it was apt to compare it to a Walmart, perhaps.
By coincidence, the end of June is also the point at which my annual spending is tabulated to see if I retain my VIP membership for another year. For the first time since I became a VIP at least a decade ago, I didn't hit the threshold. I didn't even come close. So, the magic definitely was already gone.
Still, I visited the branch near my office, one last time this afternoon. A lot of the logos were already covered up, but the staff still wore vests with the name that tomorrow will just be a piece of history. I bought a small bottle of iced coffee, displaying my VIP membership card to the clerk for the final time. Just to say I did.
I know it's dumb to feel sad about a store changing its name, a giant corporation. But, I won't forget that debate about whether or not it was like Walmart. I won't forget that same girlfriend telling me how cool she thought their logo was from her childhood, and feeling disappointed when I revealed to her what the simple shapes were actually forming.
I won't forget discussing with my first boss here about how to pronounce the name that will now be a relic. I won't forget walking there to buy bottled water after a massive storm hit in my first year here and there was no running water for four days. I won't forget it being my only weekly outing for groceries during the worst of the COVID lockdowns. I won't forget going there on my second date with the person who would end up being my partner, after dinner, just wandering around and laughing. And somehow knowing at that point that she was the one.
The stores will still be there tomorrow. They will physically exist. I can go shop at one. But, it's just not the same. God, I feel stupid for even thinking this way about stores, about a place I go to spend money to buy toilet paper or salad dressing. Well I might be stupid and hopelessly a part of the capitalist machine. But I'm not dead, at least. FYI.