20/9 Jacket shopping

Tuesday 20th Sept

As Jerry Seinfeld said to George “It’s a show about Nothing. Nothing happens . . . we go shopping . . . that’s an episode”.

We got the hotel manager to fill in one of those cards that say “Please take me to . . .” in Chinese and caught the bus outside the hotel. There seems to be a bus officer on duty at each stop and they direct you to the correct stop, hail the bus and tell the on-board conductor where to throw you off. The fare for a 15 minute trip was 15c and we got dropped off right outside a huge 6 storey shopping centre devoted almost entirely to clothes. After about an hour of looking around and trying on various Chinese brand outer garments, I was almost ready to spend 260 Rmb (yen) on a slight improvement to the $18 jacket I had left in Perth. But suddenly “Columbia” caught my eye and I recognised exactly what I wanted, or at least a pirated close copy. Weatherproof outer shell and detachable fleece. The stallholder only had the one garment anything like it but it was a good fit for me so I asked her what she wanted, expecting to hear a thousand and something. 198 !!! Surely that must be $US? My evil heart skipped and I calmly showed her 200 yen . . . yes that’s right. It was like the Ikea advert . . . I wanted to scream “start the caaaaaaar”. Old instincts reasserted themselves and I suavely offered her 145.  No she wanted 198. Hell that’s $30. I handed over the 200 and we headed off to try and find another one. 

Hours later we were tired. Tired. *T*I*R*E*D* We were beginning to encounter the smelly underbelly of Chinese reality. The kids in bottomless nappies do the natural thing wherever they happen to be and some of the public toilets really cannot be described. I remembered that I had no legwear between cargo pants and a suit and bought a pair of trousers in about 5 minutes. Hell this Chinese food shrinks clothes!!! There was an interesting follow-up 30 metres round the corner to get hems sewed in  . . . a snip, a few stitches, a puff of steam and $1 and we were on our way. J spotted a little boy probably just short of 12 months, playing delightedly with a pack of cards. Hesitantly, she asked if she could take a photo, at which stage it became apparent that the woman holding him wasn’t his Mum. Parenting is a community function here, as in much of the third world. Eventually Dad said yes and baby then revealed that he was not just active and charming . . . he was a Show Pony too. His performance drew squeals of delight from all the spectators. You will not believe it, but honestly it was only at this stage that we realised that his family subscribe to the Bottomless Pants school of babywear. Yes he is a boy.

We were lucky and delighted to stumble across one of those wonderful Asian bakeries that sell a huge range of delectable pastries and breads and make fine $2 cappucinos and hazelnut lattes. This gave us the oomph to negotiate the subway under the major road outside and catch the same-numbered bus sort of back to the hotel.  We did it!! We got home and booked another 2 nights in Beijing. Tomorrow we are going to try The Great Wall. Discussed it over dinner at Happy Harriet’s. Just one week ago we were packed and ready to leave Perth.