A Shopping Expedition

A Shopping Expedition

Yesterday was another day of shopping and window shopping around the town of Southampton. I have to admit that these are 2 skills that I am not quite good at. When I do shop, I would usually have in mind what I want before hand, go to the particular place where I know I can get what I want, race to the payment counter as quickly as possible for payment, and leave. If I stay around longer and ponder upon the choices on display, I would begin to feel heady, and everything on the shelf would start to look the same to me. That is when I begin to feel sleepy, and thus start to yawn incessantly.

But yesterday, I was accompanying my mother (or rather she was assisting me) with the business of shopping and window shopping. Keeping up with her was quite a challenge. We were looking for a handbag for my fiancée as part of my hantaran to her for the wedding. We must have gone to not less than 10 retail outlets yesterday. My mum was in her mettle, looking through the sea of handbags on display, and assessing the shapes and designs like a pro.

At the beginning of our quest yesterday, I still managed to be helpful and gave her my opinions of the choices she showed me, with my fiancée’s preferred design in mind. But after the 3rd shop, all the handbags began to look the same to me, and in one instance, I even mistook a whole shelf of woman’s knickers for fancy handbags. My mum however managed to keep her composure, and was still making comparisons of the designs of the different handbags from the various shops we’d been to in her head. It amazes me how she could still recall a particular handbag she’d seen 3 shops ago when I could barely remember how the interior of that particular shop looked like by that time.

So as we progressed to what must have seem our hundredth shop of the day, myself and my brother (who had to tag along to give directions) went into cruise control, and just tagged along with our go-getting mum with minimal fuss and question. My mum was, still however in full vigour by that time, eyeing any women’s accessories shop or general store that we might have missed out, while my brother and I were close to being like casualties of a failed search expedition.

My mum chided me by saying I should begin to get used to this since I might have to answer more of this call of duty once I’m married. I guess I should. What made the shopping experience yesterday difficult was the fact that I was getting increasingly unsure whether I would be getting the right handbag design in the end. It’s not that I’m getting this for myself you see. And judging from all the handbags on display yesterday, I could not recall them to being in close resemblance to the ones my fiancée and I had surveyed earlier. I have to say the designs here are less conservative (or rather not conservative enough to my liking, given the purpose I’m buying it for), which I find it an irony since the British are known for their conservatism.

In the end, we didn’t manage to find a suitable handbag yesterday. General Zaleha will continue search operation with Corporal Izwan and Chief Navigator Didi at a later mentioned time.

Mum, I take my hat off to you!