Fuit and Vegetables

Vegetable Market
Originally uploaded by Kees & Sarah

Fruit and vegetables is something that is available in abundance in China. Depending on where you live it can be a bit seasonal, but there always seems to be variety and bulk. For instance the photo here was taken in Chengdu in our local vegetable market and it basically looked like this every day of the year, now we have moved to Xining things have become a little more seasonal, but there still has not been a problem buying a wide variety of vegetables, the variety of fruit was a little less in the winter, but that has picked back up again.
Fruit and especially vegetables are cheap in this part of the world. For instance, in Chengdu, we would spend about 25 Yuan a week on vegetables, that is about 2.5 Euro or 1.8 Pound^*. Fruit is a little more expensive, for instance bananas cost about 5 Yuan per kilo (which is cheap) and yesterday I bought a pineapple for 5 Yuan, included peeling it (which is incredibly cheap).
The best place to buy fruit and veg is on the street or in the local markets. Supermarkets do sell it as well, but it tends to be more expensive, which the exception of the odd special offer, and not such a good quality. Of course it is much more fun to buy things 'on the street' and much better for your language.

^*The problem with converting amounts to western currency is of course that it makes it look way cheaper than it is in reality. You also need to keep in mind that the wages here are much lower, for instance a teacher (which is a respectable job) earns between 1,500 and 3,000 Yuan a month, depending on grade (3000 Yuan is about 300 Euro or 215 Pound) and a lot people don't even make a 1000 Yuan.