Miscellanea

• Before heading out to one of the tourist sites for the day, my wife and I stopped into the local Subway to get some sandwiches for the road. The staff there had perfectly functional English (as far as ordering sandwiches goes) which was both surprising and wonderful.
  We finished paying for our sandwiches and thanked the gal in Chinese, using one of the few phrases we can manage at this point.
  
  Oddly, she answered back "gracias".

• There's a somewhat impromptu market across the street from where we are staying and while strolling through there Katie found some serving dinnerware that were exactly in the same style as our current dishes. Since spying these, she has been making plans to figure out how to get them back home in one piece since similar goods in the US are much more expensive.
  
  Just how similar are these items compared to what we can buy at Target back home? Well, not only do they look identical but they have the text "Target" and their logo inked onto the bottom of each item. I don't know if these are stolen, factory rejects, or knock-offs and I don't know if it really matters.

• There are a wide variety of markets here and depending on the expected clientel, the approach in bargaining with a merchant varies. A few days ago we were at a tourist hot-spot: the Pearl Market (the market sells more than pearls but is famous for said goods). The merchants there are used to dealing with foreigners who have cash to burn and mark-up their items accordingly. Katie was interested in some scrolls and we were able to negotiate the price down from 350 yuan to 250 yuan. Along the way from the opening price to the final price we were given counter offers:
  
  310- "This is 'friend' price."
  
  280- "This what locals pay."
  
  260- "This is good deal."
  
  255- "250 is unlucky Chinese number." (This was my favorite)
  
  After scowling and laughing my way through the string of counter-offers our original offer was accepted and I felt pretty good about holding steady. I knew we didn't do a fantastic job of negotiating but we were new at this. I didn't realize how horridly we had been ripped-off until our host who was there with us showed us some silk clothing she had purchased while waiting for us.
  
  Original price: 380 yuan
  
  Final price: 50 yuan (and she thinks she could have gone lower)

• One more thing on the pearl market: the merchants are VERY aggressive. As soon as the white-skinned people show up they spring out of their stalls and loudly begin their sales pitch. Irritatingly, most begin with, "Hello, friend...". I felt like a carcass being picked over with vulture-merchants all simlutaneously moving in for the kill. The worst were those the physically pulled on me or that followed us long past we had left the area of their stalls. There were several that ignored us and were busy reading newspapers, magazines, and books. I felt like I should buy something, anything, from them to reward their non-aggressiveness and teach all the others a lesson.
  
  Alternatively, I've been trying to think of a way that I could be equally annoying to the merchants and make it very clear to them that I am not interested in anything they are selling and highly disapprove of their behavior. I've decided that I need to carry a small squirt-gun and every time one of them jumps out in front of me and opens her mouth to say, "Hello, fri....", right then I'll squirt her in the face. True, this does sort of escalate matters and will probably result in a yelling match in several different languages but it would be funny for at least a few moments.
  
  Overall, I don't think the merchants would be very happy with me and would feel I had done something rude. At least, then, there would be equality between us and we could both go home unhappy.