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Postcard From The Algarve March 08

There is a major supermarket conspiracy in the Algarve which will soon spread to Scotland, if it has not already done so.  This report is based on extensive research conducted through six visits to three different establishments (two each - you can be too extensive).

The first part of the conspiracy involves changing all the displays around. So, when you reach out to your right to grab a tin of baked beans from the place in which baked beans have lived for the last five years, your hand will close round a bottle of beer. Now a b.of b. might be quite welcome, but not quite the stuff to pour over your toast. Dog food has been replaced by light bulbs, and loo rolls by liquorice all sorts.

Now I am adaptable, I don’t lie down in the aisles and scream, I can cope, but the second part of the conspiracy is what causes me real distress. Every single item has gone up by twenty to fifty cents - the pound sterling is equal to €1.30 (and that’s another thing. When I came here six years ago, it was equal to €1.60).

I asked the manager of one store (he is Portuguese but speaks English, French, and German) the reason for the price rises. ‘We have had to make all these changes to the shelves. It costs a lot of money in staff time and new equipment, so we’ve had to increase prices to pay for them’. 

So, why did he make all these changes, had the customers been complaining? ‘No, but all the other supermarkets have been changing their stock around, so we have to keep up with them.’ It’s a part of the Portuguese psyche with which I will never come to terms.

One of the major English language papers is given away free at supermarkets, but newsagents charge for them. Cars double park on pedestrian crossings outside schools. Elderly motorcyclists wear crash helmets but don’t fasten the chinstraps Waitresses have to wear head coverings, but fish sellers in the market are not required to wear gloves. 

Still, with Johnny Walker at £7.00 a bottle, who cares?