Market Friday: shopping at Robinson mall in New Road.

I do miss seeing posts by @dswigle with her beautiful photos of flowers. She has been on a break over a month now and I wish her a very happy Christmas and a happy New Year. So, she could come back to posting with more colourful photos after the new year. Trying to keep up with the festive season, I persuaded myself to go shopping at the Robinson mall near the river. Robinson is an old medium size shopping mall which doesn’t stock expensive western brand names’ products. So, this mall is frequented by local people and middle income or working people.

Robinson has been established on New road over fifty years ago. The atmosphere is very friendly and easygoing, customers could get inside with cheap sandals and old fashioned clothes without feeling out of place. The store assistants wouldn’t give a poor looking customer a dirty look like one would often get in five star luxurious malls. Most customers wouldn’t be carrying Hermes bag or wearing Gucci belt. The watch section is also very humble with affordable Japanese and Swiss watches.

This mall is very popular among middle eastern, Nigerian and Indian tourists. The hotels nearby cater for short and long stay tourists with fully service apartments. Recently I have spotted wealthy Chinese tourists shopping for cookware and cutlery, they probably rented a service apartment with kitchen. So, looking around Robinson, I could gauge whether the tourist industry has improved lately. Indian tourists like to take the whole family on holiday in Bangkok. The Sinhalese tourists like Bangkok as they are mostly practicing Buddhists and would like to visit famous temples in Thailand.

I was glad to see lots of Christmas decorations at Robinson. The sparkling red, gold and deep green colours did cheer me up a lot. I could hear the Christmas songs playing repeatedly in the store “dashing through the snow!” Luckily most local customers couldn’t understand the English songs, otherwise they would have thought it’s funny as there is no snow outside Robinson. Perhaps in thirty years’ time we could see hail storms or frost in Bangkok due to Mini Ice Age. People were very excited with frost in the north of Thailand last week. There’s traffic jam on those mountain roads!

This mall is very compact and has only four levels of shopping space with the underground level being a supermarket. So, I could do my shopping in under an hour as things are nicely arranged in proximity of other sections. I like to stroll around the toy section and the plastic container sections as I might find some nice plastic boxes for packing my stuff.

The soft toys seemed to greet me and smiled whenever I approached them. But I had to tell them that I couldn’t bring them home with me as I already had orange cats. We have become good friends and if someone bought these familiar dolls, my heart would be saddened. The staff could recognise most of their regular customers. The store resembled a village market where villagers came regularly to shop for supplies, necessities and food. The security guard even commented on my long absence from the store.

The friendly and relaxing atmosphere kept me going there whenever I felt weird and off-center. The sense of share humanity and being ordinary mundane life made the staff quite sympathetic and willing to offer help to customers. I could even ask for some sticky tape for mending a hole in my trousers. The staff were laughing at me walking with a hole at the back of my trousers. So, I could travel home with less embarrassment. The other time, my sandal fell off the rubber sole, so I approached a staff for some string to tie the pieces together. I couldn’t do these emergency repairs in luxurious shopping malls.

Some regular customers even bought some staff take away food, brought them some fruits and sweets. These staff told me that these customers were very kind and they had known each other several years. Some time ago, a security guard told me that some wealthy customer regularly gave him big tips and helped him with his rent. One rich customer even gave him a new job with free accommodation. So, this mall has become like a small village where regular customers became friends with some nice staff.

I liked the ways some staff helped out other sections during their house-keeping cycles when lifting of boxes needed stronger arms. These staff gave very friendly service to tourists and tried their best with limited English language capability. I had to assist some staff from time to time. I have been so accustomed to such relaxing and easygoing shopping mall that it made me reluctant to go shopping elsewhere.

I was a bit worried by the new management when there’s a rumour of major renovations and modernisation. I was afraid that this place would become more high end with staff in neat uniforms and specially trained etiquette (like in luxurious malls where speaking manners became haughty). I just hoped and prayed that good things in this mall would last forever, and that no bright idea from the management would be forthcoming. I wondered why ‘clever’ people liked to make changes to the established routine which operated smoothly at low cost.

Most improvements I have seen in various organisations often brought about unexpected results and deteriorating conditions for local stakeholders. Most improvement projects had the hidden agenda of commission which meant that contractors had to shortcut the specifications. It’s a sad reality that corruptions have spread to all levels of our society. I hope and pray that more hidden truth would become public knowledge in the new year. Meanwhile I have to cheer myself up by feeding stray cats and enjoy the nice cool winter in Bangkok.

Wishing you peace, good health and prosperity.

Stay strong and cheerful.

#marketfriday hosted by @dswigle