Two Stores

Wednesday of last week I was looking at Google Maps and trying to decide on another long walk for taking my mind off of recent events.  I found a small shopping mall that I had never visited, and it had a Bed, Bath & Beyond.  There were a couple of things that I wanted to get for the kitchen, so I decided to check out the store and see what they had.

It was a nice, long walk to the mall which is called "City Shops del Valle".  (English names add a certain cachet to businesses, although I find it a bit snobbish.)

It is located in the upscale neighborhood of Colonia del Valle.  Although the northern part of Colonia del Valle is just across from Insurgentes Avenue where I live, the neighborhood extends quite a distance to the south.  It was a forty minute walk to get there.

(Notice that the Christmas tree is already up.)

I went first to the kitchenware department.  There were two things that I wanted... a vegetable peeler and a large glass baking dish.  Well, I discovered that Bed, Bath & Beyond is the same as in the U.S.  It should be called Bed, Bath & China.  They had at least a half dozen different peelers, but they were all made in China.  There were only a couple baking dishes, and they too were from China.  In fact, as I browsed through the kitchenware department, I would say that at least 90% of the merchandise said, "Hecho en China".  I continued on to look at bedding department, and at least there they had sheets, pillowcases and pillows that were "Hecho en México".  Most of the towels seemed to be from Turkey.  The only thing that I bought were a couple of nice, thick potholders that were made in India.  Why am I such a stickler about avoiding products from China?  First of all, the quality is often sub-par, and secondly, I prefer not to buy goods from a country that has such a horrendous human rights record.

I should add that last weekend Alejandro and I stopped at the Sears that is located at the World Trade Center.  There I found a vegetable peeler that is made in Switzerland (Yeah!) and a nice set of Anchor Hocking baking dishes made in the U.S.

Just behind the mall was another store that I wanted to check out... Hiperlumen. 

Lumen is a chain of stores down here that sell office supplies, stationery and arts and crafts supplies.  When you see the prefix "hiper" in front of the name of a store it means that it is super big.  I had  read reviews of the store on Google Maps, and some reviewers said that it was the best place in the city to buy art supplies.  The store did not seem that enormous, but it did have a pretty good selection of "Liquitex", a brand of acrylic paints (made in France) that I often used back in the U.S.  They also had the canvas boards on which I usually do my paintings.

So, I doubt if I will return to Bed, Bath & Beyond, but Hiperlumen will probably be the place where I will buy my art supplies.