I've been buying books of postcards here. I find them in tourist places as well as bookstores. They're thematic, such as pics of the Great Wall, Mao era, Hutongs, vintage photos, vintage movie posters... It's made things incredibly easy. As its now Monday I was able to go to China Post. Inside its all terribly officious. There are no racks of barely-post-related items on sale nor rows of postpaks jostling for attention. Instead there is a desk with a uniformed person, a box of red ink stamps and triplicate forms. Posting a postcard to anywhere in the world costs 4 rmb. That is less than $1AU. Posting a postcard in Australia is divided into 2 zones - asia and rest of the world and you pay about 3 times the price.
Books here are not terribly attention grabbing. They have a simple waxed cover and are predominantly paperbacks. Compared to an Australian bookstore, we just seem ott - fluro, gilt, 3D, slipcovers, giant photos. Most stores so far (although I haven't yet been in a big mall) are quiet with no music. The only loudness is where people are cleaning (they have no care whether they can do it later or not and they will regularly push you around as they clean something, turn on the vacuum when you are asking the price) and also bargaining and touting - yelling right in your ear if you are standing there at that time.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment