New kid in town (2)…

They have just opened a new supermarket in Sibu at the Delta Mall which is a stone’s throw away from my house. It is called…

Those of you who are familiar with the night scene in KL will probably know that there is a place by the same name – The Marketplace – but it is not a supermarket and I will refrain from mentioning what sort of sexcitement you can find there. ROTFLMAO!!!

Anyway, to get back to what I was going to tell you about, this new place was officially declared open on November 1st and I heard that it was so very crowded over the weekend and the queues at the payment counters were so long that some just gave up and went home.

I dropped by around lunchtime yesterday and there were only a few shoppers around. It is located in the basement of the mall and my first impression was that the stairs are very steep…

I have had this phobia for staircases ever since I slipped on the wet steps at a theme park in KL and fractured my arm and that took three months and subsequently, a surgery, to recover. Well, at least, in the case of this one, handrails are provided for clumsy people like me.

Once you enter, you will see the fruits and vegetables section. I would think that some of the items on special offer were quite cheap but I did not buy anything. After all, I was only there to check out the place.

…and here, you can buy your meat or seafood.

Everything is embedded in ice so I would think that they must be quite fresh, unlike at the supermarket next door (owned by a certain fat Kuching blogger). Once, I bought two frozen black pomfret (ikan bawal hitam) packed in a plastic bag there and as soon as I got home, I defrosted them and there was a peculiar stench from one so I threw it away. Then when I deep-fried the other one, it actually disintegrated right before my very eyes. I never went back there to buy anything ever again!

At this new one, there is a non-halal section at the back where you can get your fresh meat or your ham, bacon and staff. Browsing around, I spotted these small tins of my favourite sardines…

A small tin of the Marina Brand costs RM1.95 compared to RM1.90 at another supermarket in the Sibu bus station commercial area. Normally I am hopeless at remembering prices of things that I buy but it so happened that I had just bought two things of the same a day earlier. Ah well…I’m sure I will need to use up more than 5-10 sen worth of petrol to get to the other supermarket which is further away.

Moving off from there, I found these…

McVITIES’ All Butter Scottish Shortbread at RM6.10 per packet! If I remember correctly, they were selling them at RM5.80 a packet at Tesco in Sungai Petani. Fair enough, I thought! 30 sen extra to cover the shipping and handling charges and I bought two packets for my afternoon tea. They’re very much cheaper than Walkers anyway! Walkers’ shortbread is nice too but at that price (Nothing less than RM10!), poor pensioners like me can only hope for kind and generous souls like Stella to pick up a packet or two for me at the duty-free shops at the airport on the way back to Sibu. Hahahahahaha!!!

You can pay as you leave at the check-out counters right before the exit which in fact, is the entrance as well so you can bet that many will just nonchalantly march past the cashiers into the supermarket instead of using the entrance proper on the right. (You know lah! Sibu people, where got law one!!!)

See! See! You can actually see a few in the photo coming in through Lane 5! Hah!!! Didn’t I tell you so? LOL!!!