Cheap souvenirs, but feels like a prison
Municipal Handicraft Centre的点评
点评:On my last day in Suva I thought I may as well check this place out before I left. This decision was mildly regrettable. This is not a place to window shop in peace and comfort just for the experience. Unless you’re specifically looking to buy several cheap trinkets it’s best avoided. It’s a depressing structure with small cages where you’ll be over-heating due to the cramped design while you’re hounded by over-zealous salespeople who will make it their mission in life to close a sale and then keep trying to upsell more things to you long after you’ve made it clear you would prefer to leave with the one thing you actually wanted. Unless you really enjoy haggling, once you’ve seen one of the stalls, you’ve pretty much seen them all. They’re rented by different owners but they all sell similar mass produced trinkets.
The marked prices are just for show and each stall holder offered to reduce the price of anything, often well below 50%, once I picked it up then put it back down and moved on. After having been in Suva for several days I can confirm that prices are indeed significantly cheaper than stores that have the benefits of air conditioning and people who don’t constantly follow you around a space that is significantly smaller than a prison cell.
翻译:在苏瓦的最后一天,我想着离开前不妨去看看这个地方。这个决定有点后悔。这里可不是那种可以悠闲自在逛逛、体验一番的地方。除非你特意想买些便宜的小玩意儿,否则最好还是避而远之。这里环境压抑,像个个小笼子,狭小的空间让人闷热难耐,还要被热情过头的推销员围着,他们一心只想把东西卖出去,就算你明确表示只想买自己真正想要的那一个,他们也依然会不停地推销其他东西。除非你特别喜欢讨价还价,否则你只要逛过一个摊位,就等于逛遍了所有摊位。这些摊位虽然是不同的老板租的,但卖的都是大批量生产的类似小玩意儿。
标价只是个幌子,每个摊主都会主动提出给我打折,通常低于五折,但我只要拿起东西又放下,然后继续逛别的摊位,他们就会这么做。在苏瓦待了几天之后,我可以证实,这里的物价确实比那些有空调、不会有人在你周围不停跟着你的商店便宜得多,而且这里的空间比监狱牢房还要小得多。