Monday, December 26, 2005

The barbarous plebeians of City Centre

I have just spent the most wonderful morning at City Centre. Yes the morning was great, sun was shining, humidity was hiding, had money in my purse, drivers were finally getting the message that this chick means business and keeping a very wide berth and I even got a perfect parking spot at the mall. End of morning.

Enter City Centre. Up the escalator. Shame like, people don't know how to smile. Reach the top, turn right...........heading towards Debenhams. Rumour had it that they had some Light Sabers on their shelves....yum yum...here I come.....I must have looked dead excited, I was starting to attract funny looks from people. Trudging through the crowds I thought to myself, these people can actually walk straight towards you and not move, not one person....they are so ME ME ME

Into Debenhams......now starting to pick up the pace a little. Scanning the shelves....YES. there it was. One little light saber waiting for me. ...........You cannot imagine how much this means to me. Especially when I spent all night promising a 7 year old that was throwing up that a little fairy had told me that there were some light sabers to be had. He looked at me, and said 'Mum, you are so clever, and you have the best fairies as friends'. Ok now off to pay. 5 mins later still waiting to pay. 10 mins later.....laaaaahdeeeedahhhhh here she comes....prancing along....doesn't matter that they waited for me kindof attitude. Runs it up. Still hasn't looked at me. 150. hmm me:hello? reply:150 Me: hello reply:150 Me: here is your 150, and my hello and my goodbye. reply: thankyou ma'am.....Ok, so she does not want to talk to customers. Just bleet out the price and away you go.
Upstairs....grab a nice blouse. Into changing room. Trying it on. The most awful singing going on in the next cubicle.....higher pitched....oh feck...this mirror is gonna crack any second......Celine Dion, watch out. Blouse didn't fit. Don't they know we have boobies? I mean honestly they make a ladies blouse assuming that we are all wearing M&S's minimisers. GET A LIFE
Out of cubicle. sales assistant in my face, still singing. WHAT??? It was her? She works here and subjects everyone in the cubicles to her rendition of 'My heart will go on'. What a freakin hoi polloi. They actually thought that I would buy a DH.425 blouse from a crapiola shop with a high pitched flip flop outside the door while I am cramming what is left of my cleavage into enough space for a gob stopper.

Ok enter Carrefour. me: hello security: bag me: hello security: BAG me: HELLO security: BAG NOW...........Ok, another one does not want to greet, smile, acknowledge or crap on me. I give him the treasured bag with the light saber. He seals it up in plastic in case I decide to go on a pilfering spree. 7 yr old looks up at me. "thats nice mum, they dont want it to get dirty or fall out of the bag, so they wrapped it in plastic for me" aha, aha, aha....time to burst his bubble. "actually, they did that so we cannot steal anything and hide it in the bag". His face was a look that I have never seen before. For the first time in his life he has been branded a thief. His only crime was being somewhere that he could potentially become a thief.

Finished shopping. Got downstairs. Buying ice cream from Baskins....old geezer approaches me and shouts "how much"? I don't answer, heck i don't work there. Again, "HOW MUCH". the saleman tells him 7 dirhams. Geezer looks at me and says TOO MUCH, why? Again I dont answer. Off he shuffles looking disgusted. Like it is my friggin fault the ice cream costs Dh 7 a value scoop.....well......I only eat the stuff.

5 comments:

BuJ said...

oh my god.. reading this made me angry.. and i know exactly what u went thru because that sounds like a typical day in shitty centre...

some of these people might have less than perfect lives compared to their customers.. true. but no use being grumpy about it. plus you do not know anything about the customer you're serving, so better behave politely unless the customer gives u reason to behave otherwise.

idiots.

PS: i really like the mint chocolate chip..oooh

moryarti said...

hope the young Jedi feels better now :)

humblemuslimah said...

I disliked this mall In fact I ve started having an aversion to malls seen so many and fed up of globalisation.

Al Ain Taxi said...

I like the pace of your writing in this entry.

Anonymous said...

yeah, i get that alot in dubai malls. and i was really excited to come back here after being in australia for 3 years. oh well. that's life i guess. it's even more disheartening when you actually try to be nice to them. and all u get are vacant stares and pushy attitudes. Though the one thing that bothers me is when people look at people strangely. i myself get quite a few strange looks, something i'm not used to after coming from places which have proper urban eitquette.