After our stay in Napa Village, the group went to a small village called Lijiang.  Its famous for its old city, which is decked out with traditional Chinese sceneries and architecture.  The buildings were quaint and had curved roofs, little streams flowing underneath the stone brick walkways, bridges, and waterwheels.  It was… cute.  There were also a lot of touristy places to buy touristy souvenirs.  This is where I did a lot of “bargaining”.  I put in quotes because it’s debatable if I actually ended up getting the best possible price. 

Since most of the items I purchased were gifts I shall be stingy with the details.  Here are the things I bought:

3x animal souvenirs

4x decoration type souvenirs

1x slightly larger decoration type souvenir

3x expensive jade thingies

1x festive looking container

Ok, in my defense, Lijiang was a super touristy place so the price of goods are exponentially higher than they should be.  In my experience, touristy places like this are no good for buying things.  The reason why I bought multiple of most items was because I figured since it was gifts, it wouldn’t hurt to have extras and buying more than one would give me leverage to demand a lower price.

First the animals.  I thought they were cool looking and pretty unique.  They came in several sizes.  Small, which was about the size of a half dollar, the mediums were about the size of small computer mouse, the large was about the size of a baseball and the extra large was freaking huge.  Not wanting to be too conspicuous, but at the same time wanting to make sure my friends don’t feel shafted, I went for the medium.  The lady told me that each one was 25 RMB each.  I easily brought it down to 3 for 50 RMB, but according to my friends, I got ripped off pretty bad.  I could’ve/should’ve gotten them for 10 RMB each.  I hate my life.

Next I bought decoration type things.  They were pretty cheap, and looked pretty cool.  3 for 10 RMB.  However!  I tried to haggled it down, or get another one for marginally cheaper.  All I could do was 4 for 12 RMB, which in my opinion is total bullcrap.  But!  Its only 12 RMB, so I can live with that.  And then!  While I was walking down another alley, I saw identical items in a different stall, but this time it was 4 for 10 RMB!  I hate my life.

Same for all the other stuff.  It was astronomically expensive; I got it down to a semi-reasonable price, but then realize that it’s still severely overpriced.  I have a shopping problem.  I confess it.  Someone save me.  The fact that I justify relatively expensive goods with “Oh, but its actually not that expensive when you convert it to US prices” might be pretty bad too.  Hopefully I won’t be too broke poor when I come back.  

Location: Lijiang, China