The Silk Market

Bargaining is an unsettling ordeal for most westerners, but it is especially so at Beijing’s high-octane Silk Market. Slowing to look at the merchandise is an invitation for a full-court press by the vendor who will do anything to stop you from walking away, usually applying a vice-like grip with acrylic nails dug deep in your arm. Some will hook your backpack with a metal pole and reel you back like a helpless sunfish. Buying an item for your wife prompts the sales girl to suggest, deadpanned, an additional purchase for your girlfriend, in yet another example of how the French are tarnishing the good name of western society.

Although the Silk Market is an obscene flouting of trademarks, there is superficial acknowledgement of a problem with apparently random inspections by authorities. I nearly had several digits severed at the knuckles during one such “roust” when, while browsing through fake Gucci watches, a warning call from the escalator cued the sales girls to slam the display cases shut and toss them behind the counter. Several minutes later, a couple of disheveled inspectors strode by, throwing only a cursory glance at the remaining wares.

I didn’t find the Silk Market as intriguing as Nassau’s Straw Market, for either the merchandise or the people. It’s an air conditioned and sterile multi-level complex that made me think of Sears on crack, but if you like to shop, this could be your Mecca.