running out of stock, dubai style!

Living in Dubai one often has some very interesting experiences. One of the recurring ones is that when something runs out of stock in one store, it's out of stock in the whole city. When I had to buy vanilla essence some time back, it was out of stock at the store where I do my groceries. So a few days later, I went to another store, and it was out there too, and at several other stores as well. And the weirdest thing is that they never say it's out of stock, the space for it on the shelf, just disappears, filled up with other items, so one is never sure, "is this where they keep it, or am I in the wrong aisle?". So when I finally spotted the vanilla back in stock a couple of weeks later, I bought 4 bottles! The same has happened to me for several other items as well!