French Silk

Is there even a Krispy Kreme location that's still open around Chicagoland? It seems like the only place you could buy their doughnuts is at Jewel. Eating Krispy Kreme doughnuts out of a box from the local grocery store is nothing like watching your doughnuts transform from dough to fully-baked doughnuts before getting covered with freshly made glaze just minutes before an employee puts the still-warm doughnuts in a box for you. Ah, heaven.

This is one of the two locations in the southside of Chicago. When I was a teenager, my dad would always have me go there and get a dozen of doughnuts for him to share with everyone. That was many years ago. Today, the building has been sitting there collecting dust for more than two years (as far as I know). Everything, including the assembly line, is still inside.

When Carlina and I peered through the fogged-up windows, I couldn't help but think of the nuclear zones in Russia from the 1950s. In these places, everyone had to get up and leave to avoid being nuked or breathing in the toxic fumes floating in the air. Many decades later, when the density of the toxic fumes dropped to a normal level, people went back to these towns and discovered that not one single thing had changed. I saw some photos online of a Russian nuclear town which name escapes me, and it was eerie seeing pictures of an elementary school, where toys and dolls still remained on the floor, math equations were still up on the chalkboard, backpacks were still hanging on the wall, and papers and pencils were still on the desks. It's as if I had went back to the 1950s and the children would return to school the next day without a worry in the world. In reality, these children who left all that stuff behind are somewhere in the world, enjoying old age.