passion is in fashion

It has been a while indeed.  Where was I all this time, you might have wondered.  Ah, I was frolicking in the far far away land of China.  Shuttling between Shanghai, Beijing, Shanghai, then Beijing (again!), and not between the industrial cities, for once.  Phew! Had the most fun with my travel partner (in crime) H, where I discovered spontaneity + party dresses + lazy brunches = good good fun.

Not so fast however, working in the garment-ish industry that I do, could not go on for a month without being summoned to at least one town where trucks outnumber people.  Got this trip over with on Tuesday, and boy it was not easy!  Came home and swiftly downed two Carlsbergs.  Beer, god’s remedy to daytrips to Guangzhou on the KTT train.

Since I made it back alive, and have had quite a good run at work lately (^____^), am thinking of a little reward for myself.  Something red?  Something in leather?  Something in red leather, perhaps!?

Image from Barneys.com

Could learn a thing or two from Zara.  Stepped in today to visit their lingerie section and found everything I fancied was available in sizes 12-18 only.  Now, I don’t believe girls of size 18 girth would like to (or should) sport string tangas and clingy stretch silk slips.  Feeling emboldened by my venti latte from this morning, I pointed out this incongruity to the manager.  She was very nice and explained that my size was simply sold out or discontinued.  Hmmm.  Not exactly helpful.  Smarter inventory management would do them good!

Despite its merchandising shortcomings, M&S still has the best basic cotton undies around.  For your “good girl” days.  ^___^

Selfridge’s is the legendary UK institution on par with Saks or Neiman.  My hotel was only a few blocks away so I happily trotted on over.

The cool thing about Selfridges is that it is truly a melting pot of everything.  The Wonder Room consists of high end jewelry such as Cartier and Chanel Haute Joaillerie, on the other side is high street shops like Topshop and Karen Millen.  Other than shopping, the place also had like seven places to eat and drink!  Truly a great way to spend a rainy day. 

All was not well, however, in this wonderland of eating and shopping.  By the afternoon it had become overly-crowded.  There were literally lines in front of Chanel and Louis Vuitton.  Very silly.  I also found the salespeople to be generally quite rude.  A combination of English snobbery and suck up for middle eastern ladies.  (Ha – more on this later.)

As a birthday gift to self I bought a pair of little earrings from Tiffany.  Yay.    I never really wear anything dangly but this one is simple enough that I can handle.  All done with shopping and I was ready to get the form for the VAT refund.  That’s when I descended into their customer service area in the basement.  Little did I know, Selfridge’s is much more like a crappy discount shop in this matter.

Have you been to the DMV lately?  Well, it’s the same idea.  The room was tiny, packed with ugly sofas and particle board furniture.  I could not even find a seat.  I took a number (a number!!!!) and sat down to read Newsweek magazine (thank god I had something to read with me.)  I literally waited for 30 minutes when they called my number and took me to yet another area (yet another area!!!) – the VIP room where supposedly the wait was shorter.  I was having none of this.  My time is very precious I would never have shopped there if I had known the process was like this.  I spoke with the supposed manager on duty.  He was useless, of course.

Looking around the room I saw an interesting phenomenon, namely, the number of middle eastern ladies in burkhas and diamond watches.  They probably accounted for more than half of the customers waiting in there.  I overheard the conversations.  They bought up Chanel jewelry, Dolce and Gabanna handbags, and all kinds of accessories like it was going out of fashion.  They also make yearly trips to London for shopping.  As one customer service representative cheerily noted: “See you next year!”

Bottom line: Selfridges is an excellent store run by monkeys.  My salesperson at Tiffany, Alisa, however, was a sweetie!