Paper Or Plastic?

I was just thinking about the couple of occasions when I went shopping in India and the store's credit card machine refused to work because of network issues or something of the sort. On one occasion, we took Akash shopping for a birthday gift and we had at least five credit and debit cards between us, but not enough cash. The birthday boy was the only one carrying cash, and he had to pay for it himself.

I just asked my husband what he thought would happen if that happened here. Well, the store would be empty in just a few minutes. People here don't carry more than ten or twenty dollars in cash. They pay for everything with their credit cards. They'd go off to the next nearest store to buy whatever it was that they needed.

So I was slightly surprised when the checkout counter guy at a particular grocery store asked, "Paper or plastic?" Now this was not our regular grocery store, so I wasn't too sure about anything. Turns out, he meant to ask if we wanted paper bags or plastic bags to take our stuff home in!