Olympics Day 6: One Dream, One Shopping Paradise

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LV, Gucci, Prada…here we come.
It’s shopping spree day for our team today. Equipped with our little Flip camera, we set out to join the thousands of athletes and Olympic tourists at one of Beijing’s hottest destinations – the Silk Market.

The slogan for this Olympics season: “One Dream, One Shopping Paradise.” I definitely agree. Looking at the trolleys and bulging suitcases that smiling athletes are dragging out the front door, there is no doubt that this is a shopping paradise.

After winding through the rows and rows of ‘branded’ shoes, bags and clothings, we commenced to the stairwell for bargaining and further browsing via product catalogs. As a first-time visitor to the Silk Market, it took our correspondent a few tries before learning the tricks to bargaining. “Hey these people are quite fun! ”

Cursed, pandered and physically dragged into shops by feisty salesgirls, the dream suddenly turned into a never-ending nightmare. Manny spent half an hour haggling with the girl at the jeans shop, who started off by calling him Handsome and slowly progressed into Mr Stingy as prices dipped. I couldn’t stop laughing as I documented the whole process with our little Flip camera.

Before leaving, we decided to get a few shots with the big camera. The whole complex was filled with media people. So we followed them to the main reception to see what other news crews were filming. There, we were greeted by the Media Desk and were each presented with a little souvenir. We were even offered a media tour for filming in the market. Now that’s real hospitality. Can we get a shot of that ‘Prada’ bag, please?