Germany Doesn't Suck

Part 1

Due to the fact that I travel around when I’m on extended trips and also Air Asia’s 15 kg checked baggage allowance, I usually save my shopping til the end of my trip.

That’s now.

Granted, I do have one more internal flight but between that and their 7 kg cabin baggage allowance, I should be able to swing it with a few light things.

I went to a couple discount retailers yesterday (like Target and Real) and bought three sets of sheets (sheet, pillow case and bolster (which apparently I need)). Granted sheets can be bought in Germany, but they’re more colorful in Asia and a heck of a lot cheaper. I hadn’t planned on buying sheets or even looking for them, but I just happened to walk down that aisle and see them and the prices. The other interesting thing is that I had no clue as to what size I needed. I bought my bed in Germany – which uses the metric system. The sheets I looked at here were imported from the USA (oh the irony) and were in the imperial! After explaining that I didn’t know how many inches and feet my bed was to the sales girl (who barely spoke any English, but spoke the best of all her colleagues), she got a tape measure that had both units on it and we measured a mattress that was the size of mine and I found out that the sheets would (theoretically) in fact fit. Curtains – something else I do need – were in the same aisle, but I couldn’t remember the length of my windows so I didn’t look.

After returning my purchases to my room and having a bit down time, I remembered that I haven’t actually made my new place a home yet so I decided to do a bit of shopping, find some dinner and then have a few beers (in that order).

I had an idea as to what I was looking for and after a while of searching and negotiation, I decided to give up until I went back to Bangkok in a few days and change the order and have dinner. Afterwards, as I was walking to my favorite watering hole. While I was doing so, a man standing in front of a street vendor cart was advertising a product that he was selling and it was something that I was interested in. So, we negotiated on a price – he started at 1,200 THB and hen we met at 350 THB – and then he started leading me down an alley to another cart. In the US, I wouldn’t have gone but I wasn’t all that worried because it was only about 5 meters to the next card – our destination – and once there he showed me an assortment of the items I was looking for and let me look through them to figure out which one I wanted. It wasn’t until I saw him looking at the main street every ten seconds that I realized he probably wasn’t a legal vendor and was looking for the police. I didn’t care, as he had given me a good price and I loved what I saw. I do realize that I had probably overpaid a bit, but that’s life when having to negotiate in any country – not just Thailand.

After my purchase I continued on my way to the pub and came across another vendor (this one appeared to be legal) that had something else I wanted. The price started at 650 THB, but after negotiating down to 300 THB, she agreed to my price and I left with my souvineir – once again satisfied with the price I had paid.

content that I had accomplished my first two goals for the evening, I ended up at the ‘pub’ for a couple beers, did a lot of people watching and eventually returned to my hotel for a good nights sleep.

What did I buy? You’ll have to visit me and find out.