I didn’t want to hijack what was a perfectly nice thread but it reminded me of an experience with the opposite - aggressive vendors trying to sell souvenirs to tourists.
Years ago my family went on a cruise that included a stop in Jamacia where my then 9 year old son and I went on a combo outing of swimming with dolphins and hiking Dunn’s River Falls.
The hike turned out to be a bit too much for our taste and we left our group and made our way back to the parking area. The only way to get there was through a literal maze of small shops where a salesman latched on to us as soon as we entered giving us a small necklace as “a no cost gift” and started pushing every sort of souvinier imaginable. After repeatedly declining to purchase anything my son and I finally found an exit (I did end up giving him $2 for the “free” necklace just to get him to leave us alone).
So we make it back to the parking area and find a tourist van that would be leaving for the cruise port shortly and got onboard. There was an middle-aged woman already on the van and we sat just ahead of her. A few minutes later a young couple (the man holding a carved native mask) got on board having an animated discussion as they passed by that went like this:
man: I can’t believe we bought this.
**woman: **I know - it’s looks horrible man: and how much did we pay? woman: and where are we going to put it - cause it’s not going in my apartment. man: well I don’t want in mine woman: ahhh! they spelled our names wrong!
At this point I turned to the woman sitting behind me and said with a smile “it was pretty hard to resist those guys eh?” in a “we’re too wise to fall for the sales pressure like them” tone.
She looked up at me with a sheepish smile and pulled out the ugliest carved walking stick I had ever seen and said with a sigh “I don’t even know why I got this - my husband has a nice walking stick and this one is hideous but everytime I said no they lowered the price”.
Anyone else experience the sales gauntlet at Dunn’s River Falls or have similar experiences with hard sales on vacation?
I’ve experienced the roving photographers on tourist excursions or tourist areas who will offer to take your photo, then return with an offer to sell a key chain or similar useless item with your picture on it. I find it easy to kindly decline.
The one that bothers me is the photo of kid sitting on Santa’s lap, then they guilt the parent into buying a copy of it. And I don’t even have children. Maybe it isn’t as bad as I imagine, but I hate the idea of having to pay to have a kid sit on Santa’s lap.
My albuterol inhaler came in very handy in Fes, Morocco, when trying to escape the high-presure sales tactics of the leather goods shop owner who had let us look down onto the tannery from the roof of his shop. Now if I only hadn’t actually been having an asthma attack from the tannery fumes…
To get on the USS Yorktown you walk over a bridge; as you step through the entrance to the bridge there’s a photographer guy who steps in front of you that you either have to heartily decline or bob and weave to walk around or both. I politely declined a few times, finally said ‘NO THANK YOU’ to his badgering and the young man took the opportunity to insult my clothing. Niiice.
To pick up your packet for the Charleston Bridge Run you are required to walk through a rope maze that takes you past a few dozen vendor booths. The line moves slow and sales pitches are bellowed at you as you stand. Magnetic bracelets! Miracle supplements! Space age sunglasses! A different brand of magnetic bracelets! Vitamix! :smack:
Parts of Brazil— Salvador was bad in particular— have some pretty aggressive schlock vendors. One particularly annoying practice is for someone to attempt to tie a “wish ribbon” around your wrist as a “present” (which is then essentially impossible to untie and which you’re asked to give a donation for). You can just walk away, but you get an earful for it.
On Montmartre in Paris, at the Place the Tertre, you’ll get pestered by artists trying to paint your portrait. People will cut out silhouettes if you slow down and then try to sell them to you. I gave in; he asked for 20€ ($30 at the time). I told him I had $10 US and he took it. I probably could have gone down to $5, since he wasn’t going to be able to sell it to anyone else, but I only had one five dollar bill in my pocket that I needed when I got back to the US.
It’s actually a pretty mediocre likeness, but it’s a nice souvenir; there were two and he put them in a cheap paper frame.
Beijing-Oriental Pearl Market. While it wasn’t “touristy” it was filled with tourists and the most aggressive saleswomen ever. They were so awesome though. They would literally grab you by the arm and pull you into the store or physically block you from leaving. This was while they spoke in wonderfully broken English during the bargaining procedures “Oh, I thought we were friends. Why you wanna pay so low?”
Agra-Just outside of the Taj Mahal. I got there really early in the morning and saw how the vendors spotting the group. It was like a weird zombie movie where the streets were silent and then I saw a blur out of the corner of my eye of something running behind a bus. Then the onslaught.
Puerto Vallarta-The beach. No I don’t want a blanket, chicklets, my hair braided, another towel, or anything else in the next 38 seconds before the next person asks.
Egypt-Edfou marketplace was horrible. I’d never come so close to punching someone who insisted on following me and “showing me shops” and then expecting a tip for showing something directly in front of me.
In all of those places, prices were insanely jacked up for tourists. However, I found speaking to them in their tongue and a gentle smile brought the prices down more than vigorous bargaining. I also never bought crap I didn’t want.
To visit the Great Wall in China you must pass by a veritable gauntlet of vendors. If you pay the slightest attention to them they will follow you and pester you endlessly.
I went on one a couple years ago, and at every single port, you’d see them lined up just past the gate to get on/off the boat. Sometimes it’d be a line of tables, sometimes tent-like things. All of them yelling at you for your money.
What I found funny though was that they all had roughly the same crap. The same glass or little knick-knack or figurine, with the only difference being the name of the island. But the vendors were invariably pushy.
When I went to China in 09, I got good at saying “bu yao”- Mandarin for “I don’t want any”, which is what you’re supposed to say to the souvenir vendors if you don’t want anything. I got a lot of practice.
In Israel, I ended up buying a pair of Naot clogs in Tel Aviv. The seller literally chased me as I was leaving the store and offered a lower price. But I actually like those clogs.
I travel a lot and I’m not going to feel bad about haggling when it’s appropriate. Heck, in most of the places I’ve been to, all the crap I read before going suggested that they’re haggling cultures, so you’re considered a fool and even a little rude if you don’t try to haggle.
And I think that’s the crux of it: America isn’t really a haggling culture (for the most part, I mean. Certainly I’ve haggled in some contexts, but rarely do we haggle at the grocery store or Best Buy). So, of course an American would see it as demeaning for a wealthier person to try to get some deal from a relatively poorer person. But if that person with less money is from a culture of haggling. . . and you’re in that culture, it isn’t rude at all.
Heck, the only clients to ever try to haggle our fee have been the (more recent) immigrants. Now, I don’t mind at all because I get that it’s part of their culture, but I guess my point is that this goes both ways. It’s all culturally relative.
Exactly why I travel in non-touristed countries when I can… Sudan instead of Egypt, Syria instead of Jordan, Bosnia instead of Croatia… all the tourist stuff is mass produced in China and in places with zillions of tourists the souvenir stands have wrecked what once was a normal place. I love ignoring these guys.
I’ve dealt with them in Jamaica, Bahamas, Paris, and even at carnival Midways in the U.S.
I give them all the same reply (lie)- “I don’t have any money.”
Even if they don’t believe you there’s not much they can come back with unless they want to start arguing that you’re lying.
Kusadasi. Good lord. Our lovely tour ended in a carpet factory where of course they tried to sell us some. And I mean I did see the most lovely carpet I have ever seen in my life. But then they followed us out into the street and halfway back to the ship!
We bought pipes also, but that was more fun - we were in control of the experience, so we enjoyed bartering a bit.
I never worry about dickering with poor people in foreign countries - do you really think you’re not bargaining down to the tourist price?