track our trek

feeling satisfied with ourselves for coming up w/ a smooth solution to the indian visa problem, we headed off to the antiques market and yuyuan gardens markets to practice our haggling skills...at the antiques market we found dozens and dozens of stalls full of ceramics, jewelry, old coins and embroidered silks..."looky, look! cheapy cheapy..." knowing the chinese are masters of making a factory produced item look ancient, we had a good time joking about amber pendants that are surely plastic resin & antique coins that are probably in the back soaking in a compound to speed the oxidation process...jokes! at the end of a long day, we came away w/ a batik tablecloth (to be used first as a temple sarong) for 50Y - a good deal - and a tshirt for 20Y (probably still a rip-off...lol!) not bad for our first time out...here's how the game goes...you say "how much?" they type some astronomical number on a calculator... you say "no way! that's crazy!" and start to walk away...they say "ok, you say how much." and hand you the calculator. then daryll always types some number that's 1/10 or less than theirs, to which they reply, "euros?" with a confused look on their face... HA! it's hilarious....eventually you work your way to something within reason...or you walk away & say forget it...more often than not when you walk away they'll come after you & give in.