Mundane for most, exciting for some, a trip to the supermarket is hardly the major highlight of your week. (And if it is, reassess your life. Please!) However, if you pretend to be a secret agent on a mission to find the rare collectable everyone wonders about, you are in for a true thrill.
Dan Kelly has made an enjoyable profession out of it. Working as a data collector left him with few transferable skills and even more peculiar experiences. All with one purpose: helping the big companies know how much to pay their employees around the world. Feels a bit more responsible, doesn’t it?
His show provokes genuine curiosity about how the world operates, making your mind wander down memory lane to your own holiday escapades. It gives an effective introduction to the country’s society and way of life without sounding pedagogical or dull.
Kelly teaches you to rely on the familiar in times of uncertainty and never give up, even if the task you are facing – like finding the price of a bra in Iran as a man – seems rather impossible.
Now extinct, his job is a tale for travel lovers. So, if one day you see a tanned man walking around a supermarket and speaking into a dictaphone, don’t scare him off – he is a nostalgic soul.
Dan Kelly’s stand-up is a funny, travel-obsessed affair worth checking out if you are ready to develop a new obsession: is it really that hard to find tofu in Greenland?
Dan Kelly: How I Went to Every Supermarket in the World, Just the Tonic at the Mash House, until 30 Aug (not 18), 7.30pm