After my visit with the Japanese folks, I noticed that Beijing's famous Silk Market was a reasonable walk away, so I decided to check it out. The Silk Market has one rule: You must haggle.
The place is a four-story crowded building just packed with clothing, scarves, jewelry, games, videos, Chinese art and just about everything you can think of, but where absolutely nothing has a price tag. The drill goes like this: You see something you like, the pushy saleswoman offers you a price, you laugh, you offer something 1/10th the value, she laughs, she types a number on a calculator lower than her first price, you laugh, she says "how much you wanna pay," you offer something slighty more, she types a new number in the calculator much higher, you walk away, she chases you, you laugh, she types a new number, you offer your first number, sold. According to the guide books, if she's still smiling when you leave, you got suckered. If she's mad, you've won.
Haggling it not exactly my specialty but I was there so I figured I'd give it a shot. The items I purchased shall remain nameless lest any readers of this blog receive them, but let's just say I bought two things and after one purchase the lady was smiling and after the other she looked like she was going to kill me. I figured I'd cut my losses. Oh how I wished I had a partner in the haggling though. Those couples that were working the floor seemed to be making lots of people very, very mad.
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