Jeff here. Today was a fun and mostly relaxing day. After the Great Wall hike yesterday Patty and I definitely needed a good sleep in. Our day didn't start until around 10:30 am and it truly began slowly. We meandered down to the courtyard of our hostel and ordered breakfast. Patty began writing yesterday's blog while we were waiting for our breakfast and I looked into some places to go to shop today. A worker at our hostel recommended going to a mall called Silk Street, so we decided to head there. First, however, Patty had to finish the post, and we didn't actually leave our hostel until about 1:00 pm. This blog can be frustrating at times!
We hopped on a bus a couple minute's walk from the hostel and were on our way. Happily, the bus dropped us off right outside Silk Street about 30 minutes later. The mall is basically a flea market. It is several floors of shops with workers calling out to people to come look at their wares. Before starting off on our shopping excursion, however, we decided to head down into the basement where there are a bunch of different restaurants to eat. I got a chicken, rice, and vegetable dish, while Patty got a noodle soup of some sort. My meal was pretty good, I don't think Patty enjoyed hers very much. Anyway, back to shopping.
Being very unfamiliar with the barter form of shopping, it's slightly awkward at first and somewhat intimidating, but I think by the end Patty and I got the hang of it. We were told to offer about 30% of the price that was initially offered to us. The first store we went into, this did not go so well.
It was a jean store and Patty picked out about three pairs of jeans and then we picked out two for me. The first price they offered for the five pairs of jeans was pretty outrageous -- about $300, which was to be expected. However, our bartering technique left much to be desired so we ended up humming and hawing and really pissing off the workers. In the end we were basically booted out of the storing for being so annoying! We had a good laugh about this.
In some of the next stores we had some more luck, and began forming a general strategy for attaining the lowest prices. It's funny, it's like a game. It's very psychological. One strategy we liked was to show a moderate amount of interest in one item, then walk away. A worker would then begin yelling increasingly lower prices at us. Patty bought a light Nike jacket for less than $15, a cool dress for $15, a North Face jacket for about $22, and a pair of "Diesel" jeans for about $30 (our worst purchase, but in our defense, the first thing we bought). I also bought a pair of "Puma" swimming trunks for less than $9. All in all, it was pretty fun. The best was actually when Patty bought her dress. Originally the worker asked for about 1600 Yuan, which is more than $250. Patty kept saying no and the girl kept pulling her back and offering less. Patty ended up paying 90 Yuan, less than 6% of the original asking price!! Man, that's just crazy. If that's the kind of mark-up we were dealing with, we still probably got screwed! Oh well, we got some nice stuff that hopefully doesn't fall apart the second we put it on!
After shopping, we jumped back on the bus and headed home. We were meeting with my friend Dale again for dinner. We had a nice dinner at our hostel tonight and talked mostly about traveling. The guy has so many insights on where we could go in China that we've re-thought our entire travels here. We are now considering ignoring the east coast and heading down to Yunnan and Guangxi. We discovered tonight that we could actually have experienced some true Tibetan culture and seen the Himalayas in Yunnan had we been traveling in the summer months. Unfortunately, it seems a little too cold to do those things at this time. We will stay further south and to the east of the mountains, but the region is supposed to be beautiful, nonetheless.
We will need to do some more research regarding how we will switch up our itineraries, but we will try to keep you up to speed on any decisions we make. I'm really glad that we've decided to go a different route, since I wasn't really crazy about our itinerary in the first place.
Tomorrow I think we are off to the Summer Palace and will do some more shopping. Hopefully that all goes according to plan. At least we are done the blog relatively early tonight! Now let's see if we actually go to bed! Bye for now :)
Yes, as you've discovered walking away is a very powerful act, for both putting distance between you and the crazy people, and for turning outrageous prices into more palatable ones. And don't worry about suggesting prices that are too low; first of all, they probably aren't, and second, the worst that will happen is you and your family will be cursed. I that's what happened to Tressa and I outside the Colosseum in Rome, although he was speaking in Italian so we couldn't be sure. ;)
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I love bargaining!!! I thought that was one of the most fun parts about HK when I was there. Although I'm very sure you get WAAAAAY better deals in China - I couldn't go since I didn't have a visa (And was only there for 8 days..) My favourite strategy was only putting a bit of money in my pockets - asking for an obscurely low number, and when they look at you like you're crazy, you pull out your pocket and say cuz it's all you got, and start to walk away. That's when they give in. hehehehe anyways, this looks like so much fun, i'm so jealous! :)
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