In Sweden there
are hardly any proper butcher’s shops left. The closest you get to a butchers’
is the ”fresh” meat area of a supermarket, but even so that kind of business is
dying down in favour of pre-packed meat.
The small supermarket
where my friend works is situated in a village near my hometown where the local
dialect is very strong. I found it amusing to listen to the customers who sounded
very rude, even if they didn't mean to. There aren't any pleases and not too
many thank yous in Sweden.
At the end of the
day I helped with the washing up, rinsing off corpse parts from the trays and
pouring bloody water down the sink. And I was close to puking when I was shown
the ox tongue. My friend thought I would get used to it, but I declined her
offer to spend another day at her workplace ... To me, eating pigs and cows and sheep is the same as eating cats and dogs and other pets, so that's why I find it so hard to handle meat.
I’m pretty
convinced I’ll remain a vegetarian for the rest of my life. It’s better for the
animals, the environment and the health. Even though it was a small supermarket,
I was happy to find a few vegetarian and vegan products like oat ice-cream and
soya sausages. In general I think there are more and better veggie options in
English shops, and the labeling in Britain is great: you don’t have to read
the ingredients, just look for the wording ”suitable for vegetarians” which doesn't exist in Sweden.
