Which leads me to my next topic in this post - something else that makes me go gaga - shopping. Friends and family know me as a shopping maniac (pre-Rosabelle days, of course - nowadays, it's mostly her stuff and grocery shopping...), and I am extremely organized when planning shopping trips/holidays. For example, I abide by the 'octopus rule' when covering a shopping mall or street - i.e. I will look only at the stalls/stores on my right-hand side, taking right turns all the way until I come full-circle, before looking at stalls/stores on my lef-hand side, taking left turns all the way. This way, I can then manage to cover ALL the stores without walking unnecessarily and wasting time/energy. HMPH!
So, the other day, when a mummy in the yard asked if I was interested in attending a Calvin Klein closed-door sale (only open to family and friends holding invites), I jumped at it. With two tickets in hand, Wayne and I prepared for the first day of their two-day sale. We were late in going as I brought Rosabelle down first whilst Wayne had his morning dose of basketball. I strategized in the car: I only brought our cash down since they accept only cash, and left my bag in the car as I didn't want extra baggage to carry/look after. I wore a denim skirt (easier to try bottoms) and tight T-shirt (easier to slip on tops), with slippers (easier to try on shoes) - I deliberated whether I should wear my contact lenses in case I had to keep pushing my specs up from all the perspiring, but decided it was too extreme. I told Wayne I should have worn yesterday's smelly clothes so that other people would stay a distance from me, thus paving the way for my leisurely shopping, haha!
By the time we reached, it was already 10:30am (opens from 10am to 2 pm), and it was similar to the Singapore Expo, though on a smaller scale. They rented a multi-purpose function hall at Sogo Junefield, and already there were at least 200 people in there going through about 20 bins of clothes. They handed out trash bags at the door for us to put our selections in, and I wasted no time in going through the items. Anything that seemed 'iffy', I just dumped into the bag first - no time to ponder/hesitate, with so many other people/competitors around.
Alot of the items were repetitive, and after some time, my arms and hands were getting sore from having to wade through the heavy items of clothing, and lugging the heavy trash bags on my shoulders at the same time. Luckily we spotted the other mummies in the yard and left our selected items with them first as they took a rest by the side whilst we continued our scavenging.
As the lunch-time crowd came, it got even more packed, and we actually missed out on grabbing the hot favourites - CK underwear. I heard that those who came first thing when the doors opened headed for the underwear section directly, grabbing boxes and boxes of them. Silly me got waylaid and distracted at the door - darn. I saw many with bags and bags of clothes, most likely wanting to re-sell them online or in their stores.
In the end, Wayne and I finished our shopping (we spent about 2 hours in there), and went aside to check through the items and try them on, sieving out the 'to buys' from the 'nope, don't buys'. We were so thirsty and hungry after that we went for lunch directly, and the other mummies in the yard still stayed on to 'look through the items again as many people had just left, and they have emptied their items back into the bins'. Sheesh, and I thought I was thorough enough - this is in spite of them having gone through the place at least 4 times prior!
Our damage? RMB3,470 worth of items (about SGD700+) - all 41 pieces of them, with a retail value of more than RMB17,000 - translating into an average of 80% discount. I bought a few pieces for my mum and sis, and got myself 3 winter jackets, a sweater, a pair of sleeping boxers, 4 bottoms and 15 tops. Yikes...
When I came through our house door lugging one bag, the nanny stared at me and asked if I was buying stuff to bring back to Singapore. I told her this was our shopping, and her mouth opened wider when Wayne followed behind with yet another bag. Luckily she snapped out of her shock quickly when I presented her with a beautiful T-shirt as well. She's happy, Wayne's happy, I'm very happy, very pleased with my buys (though I had to spend the whole afternoon making space in my wardrobe for the new clothes by giving the nanny some of my old stuff). Ho hum.
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