“First-time Customer; I Give You Best Price”

I spent my second day in Beijing shopping for 5 hours in the Silk Market, a very popular tourist bazaar. It is in a one and half year old building with 6 floors (before that the shops were on the street).

I bought the following items: Prada shoes (150 RMB), Louis Vuitton tennis shoes (200 RMB), 2 Polo Shirts (45 RMB total), Armani dress shirt (40 RMB), 2 Cashmere Burberry Scarves (90 RMB total), and a stocking cap (20 RMB). Ash bought very similar items, as well as two silk bed sets for 400 RMB.

My first experience in the shop was pretty ridiculous—Ash, Avik and I walked in and immediately we were bombarded with question from the merchants: “Would you like Polo shirt?”; “Nice bag for your girlfriend?”; “You want shoes?” I was pretty overwhelmed at first—I don’t really like talking to salespeople in the U.S., but this is much more intense. If you stand still for more than a few seconds you are guaranteed to have someone grab your arm and drag you to their store.

When you finally find something you want, then you have to start bargaining. For something like shoes, they will start off with a price of about 800-1000 RMB. Then they will ask you for a price, and in general it is safe to knock off between 75-90%. They will then stare at you and tell you that you must be crazy, that it’s not possible, and ask you for your “real price.” The key is to stick with your original price while they bid themselves down. Most likely this will require walking away from the shop, because there are so many shops with the same gear that they will drop their price to keep you. Once they are in your general range then you can raise your bid to come to a compromise. Ash and I would do this once for an item, and once we figured out the general “best” price, we would use this to negotiate with other merchants. We got some items for so cheap that other merchants we spoke to that day didn’t believe we bought them for so cheap.

Ash and I got lunch in the Silk Market and met two women from Britain, one of which recently gave birth to a baby girl. She told us that she is going to move from Beijing soon because the pollution is so bad. She told us that on Stage 4 days children are not allowed outside, and on Stage 5 days no one can go outside. The government actually decides which days will be “blue sky” days—days when no factories will run to cut down on pollution. For the Olympics, no cars will be allowed in the city for a month, and all construction will be stopped.

Later that night the group went to a club which was okay, but afterwards I got to play the drums at another bar.