Episode 2 (A bag full-o' Clones)

From a country far, far away.....the second episode of my vacation...

I had it all scheduled from day one, first of course was my visit to my father's grave..."you should've waited", I stubornly told him for the nth time..again. Then a courtesy call to relatives and friends... amazing thing, Time is, ..fat, bald, sexy, ugly, kinder, meaner...everybody changed.
Then to the task at hand - Shopping, what's a visit to PI without going to the malls. Megamall is still damn huge, no matter how long I stayed in it, I always leave with my satisfaction meter half empty...dont start on me with that half full thingie, its always gonna be half empty. My cousin, who was also vacationing from LA said, "look at 'em, its 3pm, its mid-week, and they're all here...so...jobless." I giggled...pause....hmmm...that's sad. It must have been the heat. I gave up Megamall, too many people, too little time.

Off to Greenhills, where anything that is less..is the price, and the quality. Its imitation heaven...like eBay, except its real. Who cares, as my best friend puts it " it doesnt matter if you're wearing the authentic one or not, because in Manila, fakies are so common that most of the time people would think you're wearing a fake, even if its the real thing." At Greenhills the game is all about knowing how to spot good forgeries and haggling, talents I believed I am very good at.

I bought a $25.00 Armani bag, the saleslady said its real leather, i didnt mind the brand, I only wanted a leather bag...two days later the seams split and revealed a very not-so-leather inner Iining. The DVD movies I bought, when played, had tiny silhouette heads bobbing around, add the laughing crowd in the echoing sound and It beats Dolby Surround in realism- like you're really there..inside the theater that is. An Anti-Virus program I bought didnt even have anything in it, the list goes on. Its was all like buying an Ipod, that broke, and when you tried to pry it open, revealed a mini a cassete recorder inside..double whammy.

"You moron", my buddy tells me as I closed with what I thought was a good deal. All The tell-tale signs of a deceitful sale was there: the speed at which my item was wrapped as soon as i offered my price, the look of glee from the other sales ladies and the frenzy to show their other stuff made me realize my buddy was right. I caught on it later... when the price gets right, they act as if the sale would be a loss on their part, this keeps the haggling nailed within that price and then they act like bitterly giving in, buyer feels happy he outsmarted them. Stupid buyer.

One should take this as the final lesson when going cheap. Fakes are fakes, it will always get back at you with a frustrating reminder that when you go with forgeries you also expose yourself to its meaner cousins: Lies and Deceit. ...makes me wanna spell it deceipt...That is the risk I took and I cant complain because I was an accessory to the crime. Quality comes with a premium. In the long run, I think I actually spent more for things that I used only once because it broke, already in bad shape or just plain unbearably ugly now. Stupid buyer.