Shopping in Beijing

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So far I’ve had two experiences of shopping in Beijing and I’ve REALLY enjoyed both of them. The first was the day we arrived in Beijing, we went to the Hong Qiao Pearl Market down the street from the gorgeous Temple of Heaven where we had been before hand. Inside the Hong Qiao Pearl Market is plenty of stalls and quite a few proper shops selling some cool, cheap things, though not as cheap as the stalls. There were many stalls selling very similar things such as, silk scarfs, scroll paintings, traditional Chinese clothing and many little souveniers like magnets, fans, etc.

The people trying to sell things to you from their stall seem extremely desperate, trying their very hardest to get your attention, telling you that their prices are, “Very cheap”, and to completely trust them, but who is going to trust a random stranger?

One thing I really love about these markets is bargaining, it definitely isn’t an automatic thing for me to do living in Australia and all, but when in China at markets you start to always think about how you can get want you want for so much cheaper. Even though they might seem unsatisfied with your final price, they always give it to you anyway… See what I mean by desperate! I ended up getting a silk scarf for my Grandma. It was priced at 280 yuan and I bargained it down to 50 yuan, that’s $10 in Australia! I also looked at a nice scroll painting but wasn’t sure if I wanted to get it, so I just walked away from the stall, even though the shop owner was trying her very hardest to get me to buy it. After about 5 minutes the same lady found me and offered it to me for cheaper, and as I turned away and said, “No thanks”, she grabbed my arm and started to pull me back towards her stall. Av then went into full defensive mode and grabbed me away from her saying, “Don’t touch her”. As the both of us turned away to leave the lady offered the painting to us for cheaper, but we still said no and each time we turned away she kept putting the price down. It ended up being a bit of a game for us because we kept saying no and acting like we were going to leave until we got the painting for as cheap as we wanted, 30 yuan, and originally it was 250 yuan. It was so funny! We definitely scored well at this market!

The next day Autumn, Av, Ebon and I caught 2 subways to Xidan Commercial Street. In this street are huge shopping centers and I love shopping, so I was pretty excited! We only went to 2 shopping centers across the road from each other, but they were both 8 stories high and had all the big brands like Adidas and Nike. There is so much on each level that you would probably need a week to actually see it all, and everything was so shiny and new I felt like I was in a Hollywood movie, shopping in the big city of Beijing. It was pretty overwhelming, as one level had as many shops as the whole of Cairns Central back at home. Of course, I couldn’t help myself, so I bought some clothing and some for gifts as well. The prices were really quite reasonable… It was just a shame you couldn’t bargain. Overall, I had a great time with the greatest friends, walking down the streets of Beijing…the capital city of CHINA…still having the most amazing experience though I still can’t get my head around it!





Faith

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