We make it to Yashio in one piece, is good, as it was definitely more shady than usual. The driver gives us her business card and tells us to call her with 30 minutes notice if we want a ride back to campus. Surprisingly, we actually make this our plan, which is something we wouldn't even have considered two weeks ago. As we walk into the market, my experienced friend, Lara, gives us Yashio-specific advice, warning us that we have to bargain, but must bargain a little higher than we had on Sunday. She also says that the vendors are similar to the ones at Silk Street, but less "yelly". That's good. People who are yelly make me not want to buy things.
We go inside and split up. Most of the group heads to the basement for Guccis and Pradas. I have a lot of gifts to buy, as my family is very large, and I know that my 16-year old brother does not want me to bring him Versace sunglasses. Lara and I go upstairs, where people are selling statues, jewelry, chopsticks, and Maoist paraphenalia. It's a very fun place. At Silk Street, the stalls had similar items, but here there are 1 or 2 stalls for each type of merchandise, which makes it a little harder to bargain, but a lot more interesting. We look at watches for a few minutes, and then go over to a chopsticks stall, as a nice set is one of the three things I want to buy for myself in China. There are all kinds of pretty sets. Some of them have animals for chopstick stands, and others come with really pretty bowls. I pick a 2 person set with ducks stands and black bowls with painted leaves inside. I hand the box to Lara, as I know I will probably pay double the price if I bargain myself. The vendor pulls out the calculator, punches in 300 元, which is apparently is the "friend price". I'm not so sure about that, but I definitely want Lara to get the chopsticks down to less than $45 US. I don't know why I'm worried, as her next move is to punch in 20 元。 A bold move. Lara continues to insist on paying 20 until the price is 150 元. Then she says 25. 10 minutes later, I have my chopsticks for 60 元。 We turn to leave, but then I see it...
Among the multitude of chopsticks sits a lone Rubik's cube the lady is apparently trying to sell. So I solve it. The vendor is amused by my Cube skills. Lara teaches the vendor how to say "Rubik's cube" in English. They always like to learn English item words to increase sales.
We buy some gifts for our friends in America, and then Lara and I go to the clothing floor, wondering if we'll see anything we like. Clothing vendors are second only to accessory vendors in hostility, and we pass a French woman trying to explain to the merchant that she doesn't want to buy a dress that doesn't fit. The vendor insists that since she allowed the woman to try the dress on she should buy it, and that she understands it doesn't fit, but she'll give her a "decent price". It's kind of hilarious, but I'm glad I'm not the woman in the ill-fitting dress.
When I left for China, I didn't pack very many clothes, thinking that I would buy some here that I like and would wear along with what I brought. The unfortunate part of this plan is that I didn't realize that the process of clothing would prevent me from making any purchases. Any time I'm looking at clothes, I have a salesperson breathing down my neck waiting to jump when I make a selection. The prospect of bargaining has made the idea of buying lots of new items unfathomable, as I would have to negocatiate prices for all of them. At this point in the trip, I've been gone for 2.5 weeks and I still have bought no clothing.
We go to the accessories level to look at bags, discovering a terrible label on a Kipling bag.
I try to buy a fake bag of an obscure designer I've never heard of, but the lady wants 600元 and won't go down from it. We walk away and she doesn't follow us. That's just bad business, as nobody is stupid enough to pay an American price on a fake designer bag. We don't think that practice will last very long.
Shopping does get pretty old after a while, so we go outside to wait for our friends so we can call the sketchy lady to bring the cab back. Unfortunately, we sit there for too long. A man tries to sell us pirated DVDs for twice the price they are on BLCU campus, and shows us every individual DVD he has, even after we say that we really don't want to buy them. We pretend to freak out when he shows us a copy of Surf's Up, telling him in Chinese that we really really hate penguin movies. He finally leaves, laughing at us. Then a little boy, who is probably about 8 years old comes up behind us, asking for money. Even though this stuff happens every day, it's really depressing to see a child begging you and know that you really can't help them very much. One of the people in our group gives him a cookie bar that he keeps in his backpack for these instances. If they want money for food, then it's better to just give them food: It's more likely that they'll actually be able to keep it. Nobody ever knows if the person begging is being used by someone watching from behind a tree, especially if they're a kid. I decide to buy some granola bars to keep in my purse so I actually have something to give to kids who ask me for things. Later, we look down the sidewalk and see the boy give the cookie to a little girl.
Our cab driver does not arrive in the hour we wait for her, so we find another van to take us home. The driver actually has a woman with him, and it looks like they run their taxi business together. They are very nice, but some of us feel bad about ditching the sketchy lady, even if she doesn't have seat belts.
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