Distance is a strange animal but does it really explain why we need four Albert Heijn stores so close together?

Distance is a funny thing. While objectively it is a constant, a metre is always the same length, one's perception of it changes drastically, especially in Groningen.

When I first arrived in town almost a year ago, it struck me as insane that there were four Albert Heijn stores less than a kilometer apart, two of them, clearly visible to each other.

Surely there is no need for all four stores and, especially not for two on the same street a few hundred metres apart?
What possible reason could there be for someone to pick one over the other, it couldn’t be a convenience factor, they are almost next door, it had to be something else.

But, after a while, I stopped noticing it. It took a visit from a friend from the States to notice again the absurdity of it all. And, I began to realize that I almost never went to the AHs slightly further away. The extra few hundred metres were a bridge too far.

In South Africa, on the other hand I would regularly drive for 15 minutes to get to the closest mall to go shopping and think absolutely nothing of it. Yet here, I was unconsciously boycotting stores for having the temerity to locate themselves a few hundred metres farther away than is convenient for me.

Now, the concept of driving for 15 minutes to get to a grocery store is unthinkable, not only because it would entail hiring a car (which seems a lot of work for milk and bread) but also because a 15 minute car trip is a serious, planned journey here. Not something done on a whim for a bag of muesli.

Proof of this is that all the AH stores are busy and have clearly been in business for more than a year. Evidently, there are enough people in Groningen to justify all four stores and, I can’t help but turn my thoughts to the poor townspeople who lived here before the other three opened. I can imagine the tales of hardship they have to tell of having to walk those extra metres, muscles straining against shopping bags; precariously balanced beer crates on their bicycles.

Indeed, the more I live here, the more my sense of distance shifts, something brought home to me by two of the games in the World Cup. The first was the South Africa, Uruguay game, the other the Dutch versus Japan.

Watching South Africa lose is never a fun experience but, sitting in the Bar Pacific, surrounded by other South Africans, I have never felt both so far away and so close to my country at the same time. True, I wasn’t in the stadium for what was a momentous occasion for South Africa but, in my bright yellow shirt, surrounded by other people who have an attachment to the land, my voice singing the national anthem just a little more fervently than usual, I was all South African.

The second game was a happier experience, largely because the Dutch won and I got to share in the orange-coloured celebration but, I couldn’t help but wonder about the Dutch fans in South Africa who are following the team around the country. Granted most are flying, which is definitely the quicker option, but for those in cars or caravans, a six hour drive from Johannesburg (where they played against Denmark) will get you as far as Durban, where they beat Japan, and another eighteen hours or so will get you from there to the Cape where they are to face Cameroon.

From Groningen, a 18 hour drive will get you through not just a province but the whole country and, through a few other countries as well.

Indeed, in Groningen terms (judging by the number of Albert Heijns) following the Dutch team from Johannesburg, through Durban to play and then on to the Cape is an epic journey. Here's hoping that it is just the start of a journey that ends back where it started for the final.