Missing A2: #1

Some of the most faithful devotees can likely recall our list of Top 10 things We Will (Do) Miss About Ann Arbor. You also may remember the singular fact that we never never finished the last post. You may think that this is because we wanted to build suspense for a stupendous ending. You may. But you would be very wrong.

Nonetheless, Rachel and Maggie are back from our last trip to Michigan (and an unexpected one, as that), and we thought we should use this occasion to finish our list. The #1 thing on the list is...

"Specialty Grocery Stores". You probably think I'm kidding, but I'm not.

Two caveats: First, the list is not really in any important order. Second, of course what we miss the most is our many friends and our church, and believe me, several months out now, we are acutely aware of that. However, you all already knew that, so it didn't seem necessary to add it to the list.

So, on to the anticlimactic groceries. First there was Kroger and Meijer. And of course, Ann Arbor has many high-end stores like Whole Foods and Plum Market, but we're not qualified to speak on those. But we did discover Trader Joe's, the happiest food store ever. And a slew of international groceries, including Dos Hermanos, Bombay Grocers, Hua Xing Asia Market, and Aladdin's Middle Eastern Market/Sunshine Fruit Market. Each of these made our food discoveries an experience in and of themselves, and we miss them, especially in Gallup. And though, we never had the guts to purchase a durian from Hua Xing, it was still nice to know we had the option.

However, our food adventures will certainly not come to a standstill in Kenya, and we are planning some kind of food-related new year's resolution for 2010, in the style of the past Ethnic Bread experience.