My first shopping experience

Believe it or not, Southern China can actually get a little chilly. So that news and the fact that I packed very light coming here meant I needed some more clothes. This was my first time truly shopping in a couple years, so there was a lot of culture shock and other factors triggering some panic and anxiety. Such as:

- Rows of official and unofficial shops, all shapes and sizes
- Most of the goods were knock offs, or some feeble and failed attempt at writing something cool in English
- People shouting to attract customers
- people with microphones to out shout the shouters
- Loud speakers playing Chinese music to drown out the mics
- Louder speakers blasting techno music to drown out the pop music
- Employees clapping to the techno music to attract more customers
- Employees beating sticks and noise makers to beat out the clappers
- More employees ready to pounce once you do decide to enter a store
- Employees on ladders in the doorways making sure you don't LEAVE the store w/o paying

In the end, I've never had so many employees involved in my shopping experience. Yet even with the interaction of 15+ store reps, it was still ultimately and completely lacking in "customer service." I did get a nice shirt and pull over out of the ordeal though. So I guess I would do it all again...

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Byron Yee
TEFL English Teacher - Shenzhen, China