Size Matters

No, you with your dirty minds, this post isn't about that.

Americans are used to super-sized products.  We like economy sizes - enough soft soap to last a year, family-sized lasagnas that can feed eight people, the biggest car we can afford without dipping into the kids' college fund.

Australia is different.  Products here are petite, whether by necessity or by taste really depends, but it takes some getting used to.

My first experience with our size discrepancy was when we bought Isaac a mattress upon arrival.  Isaac had a mattress coming with his bed in our shipment, but he needed something to sleep on in the interim.  I went to a mattress store and got him a twin-sized mattress, better than the one he had coming on the boat.

Our shipment finally arrived.  We put the mattress on the base, and this is what we found:

If you want a mattress to fit a North American bed, you need a "king single."  Didn't know this.   Isaac likes his new mattress better than the old one, so we occasionally find him curled up on the bed slats in the morning.

Other disturbing size differences came to light with the arrival of our goods from America.

Just so sad.

My kitchen wastebasket from America is 50 liter.  Extra-large kitchen bags in Australia are 35 litre.

Our dinner plates are too large to fit well in our dishwasher.

My airbake cookie sheets fit in the oven if I tilt them a little.

Food sizes are different here, too.  Probably because Americans just eat too damn much, as a rule, but packages in the supermarket here are petite by comparison.

American tuna in the back, Australian tuna tin in the front.  I would need eight of these to make a casserole.

The smaller grocery sizes aren't in themselves a problem, except I have to go shopping for pantry items more regularly.  Two stir-fries, and my soy sauce is gone.  Ten peanut butter sandwiches, and we need more peanut butter.    The really decadent biscuits come in packets of ten, which is probably a good thing, because even eating two will give you a tummy ache.

When we first moved here, I wanted to buy another RAV4 like I had in the US.  After seeing how narrow the roads were, and how one had to squeeze through small spaces in your car, I rapidly changed my mind.  In fact the only thing that seems to be supersized here are prices.  I've commented before on petrol prices.  Another reason there are fewer larger cars/SUVs on the road has to be that it costs $5.50/gallon to run the things. 

Costco solved a few problems for me.  I was able to find trash bags that were 48.5 L - close enough to make me happy, and real honest-to-goodness American paper towels that are longer and absorbent.  


What I keep telling myself is that smaller portions are actually normal-sized.  We just need to get used to our "new normal."   Still, I wouldn't mind a venti-sized coffee once in a while.