SPL#1 - Beijing Trip (4-11Mar 06) Day 5

Shopping day!!! Took a cab to Silk Market, otherwise known as Xiu Shui Jie, in a trip that cost RMB$29. The silk market is only a three minute walk away from Xia’s home so we thought it would make better sense to make my way there myself instead of having them fetch me at my hotel. Since Xia’s mother was not working today, she accompanied the both of us on this shopping spree. And boy, did she have some tricks up her sleeve!

Here’s how she bargained on our behalf. First, the shop dealers come up with an exorbitant asking price, say maybe RMB300. Which is 400-500% above cost price. Then, Xia’s mum bargains and tells the shop dealers the product should cost no more than RMB80, for example. Next the shop dealers will say that the price quoted is too low, and make a series of counter-offers. Xia’s mum will then walk away, and would you believe it…

They would grab us by the sleeve and prevent us from leaving the shop. Serious. And tell us we can have it for the price we quoted. In the end a deal is always in the offing, no matter how they had vehemently opposed our quotation in the first place.

Courtesy of Xia’s mum, I was able to buy several jeans, pants, t-shirts and a sweater at great bargains. A pair of jeans only cost me RMB200, when the initial asking price was RMB380. A t-shirt which cost RMB180 went for only RMB70.

No, I didn't buy the beds

I can already hear you asking, are the stuffs sold original goods? Surely original goods wouldn’t be so cheap right? Well most of them are rejected original goods. That’s why they are cheap.

After we were done with the Silk Market, we took a bus to Ya Xiu market. It’s similar to Xiu Shui, and the only difference is that they are two bus stops apart. Did some shopping there as well, though I was quite disappointed I could not find any Levi’s jeans of my kind.

:(

Soon the shopping spree was over, and we went for lunch at KFC! Cheaper than SG too! Next we took a bus back to Xia’s home to get the car, and drove to the hospital to meet his father and friends. There was a massive traffic jam, and it took us more than an hour to get there. From there we set off to Zhang Shuo’s parents’ eating house.

Zhang Shuo, one of Xia’s father’s colleagues, had invited us to his parents’ eating house for dinner. Lots of fishes for dinner tonight, all made in different styles. I wonder why, but the fishes they cooked had no fishy smell, unlike what we sometimes experience when eating fishes at home. The fishes served tonight were great. Very fresh.

To go along with dinner was a bottle of Chivas Regal and some beer. And for some entertainment they had this very cute pet we enjoyed playing with. Heard it’s some kind of cross breed between a Chow Chow and something else. It looks a bit like a dog, a bit like a cat, and a bit like a bear. Didn’t bring my camera along so didn’t manage to take a picture of it :(

And sleep is always welcome after such a long day