The solution to all my shopping needs is my friend Muriel. She has retired and lives on her own, but has two grown children, five grandchildren and a constellation of friends, all of whom she is happy to entertain with food from her kitchen.

Over the years, she has become an ace-shopper, with coupon-wielding and bargain-spotting skills that reluctant shoppers like me can only dream of. So once a week, typically a Thursday, she comes by in her black Honda Accord and we head for the hunting grounds. Today, for instance, our first stop is Ocean State Job Lot. Its slogan is “A Lot More For A Lot Less”. They sell brand name products at low prices that may be the result of overstocking or packaging changes or perhaps just a shift in consumer habits.

I am looking for a gadget called a Swiffer, which combines the efficiency of a dust-cloth with a mop’s long handle for cleaning floors. Muriel leads me straight to the shelf where a variety of similar items are dangling. “This is what I use,” she says, picking out a slender green stick. She shows me how the disposable sheet of the dust-cloth is kept in place. It’s a dollar less than the online price of $10. I barely have time to fantasise about finally having clean floors when she has already danced off down the aisles to find a box of dust-cloth refills.

From there we go to Michaels, a vast treasure-house of art and craft supplies. Without Muriel I would have to wear blinkers like a tonga-horse to avoid being distracted. She quickly locates the key-chains that I want for a craft project plus matching hooks and a stack of white card paper. Then at the check-out counter, she persuades the girl to give me 40 per cent off even though I don’t have a coupon. We leave triumphant, having paid a mere $15 for goods worth twice as much.

At Stop & Shop, the grocery store, Muriel has trained me to pay attention to labels and to compare the contents of similar containers in order to avoid paying for the attractive packaging. I have learnt to shun all those aisles displaying fancy foods at even fancier prices and instead reach for whatever is unprocessed, fresh and, as far as possible, local.

Finally, we head for the local ice cream parlour. It’s always my treat and we always order the same things: a basket of French fries for Muriel and a double-scoop sundae for me, followed by coffee. It’s a popular family restaurant where the other customers range from white-haired old couples wearing red-plaid jackets to young mothers with blonde, blue-eyed children. Muriel is US-born but Portuguese by ethnic origin, belonging to the tiny island-nation of Cape Verde, off the west coast of Africa. We are often the only people of colour there, looking surprisingly alike, with our short grey hair and spectacles. We spend an hour laughing about our families, our lives and the world around us. Then she drops me home and we say goodbye for the week.

Manjula Padmanabhan, author and artist, tells us tales of her parallel life in Elsewhere, US, in this fortnightly series.

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