Embarkiya n The Rip Off
Mubarkiya which is also called Souk elKuwait or old souk or heritage market is one of the places where no matter how much you bargain you feel you just can't win. Yesterday me and Bu Abdullah decided to go there to buy few perfumes. As he knows that I am good in bargaining and I often take use of the 4 languages I can speak.
We have one shop where we always end up as we have been going there for a while now. But today we decided to check the prices in the other shops and then get back to our usual shop where we always purchase perfumes from.
So finally after reaching this place I ask my friend to stay quiet and let me take care of the prices.. So here we enter in the shop we get the usual warm welcome and hajji taby chai hajji taby mai things that happen there :) which is kind of them indeed!
I ask him for 3 different perfumes he calls some other shop guy and is asking him if he has those perfumes in stock and gets the prices and gets me the perfumes. During his conversation with the other guy which was in one of the languages spoken in India which I can't speak but understand as its similar to Urdu I heard the prices like KD 8 and KD 12. When the products arrived and this was the real time to bargain. Guess how much he told me the price of the perfumes??
The one for KD 8 he was asking KD15
The other two for KD 12 he was asking KD 28
Its more than 100% profit on a perfume and thats when I had to lie that we have checked the prices here and there and the one he was asking KD 15 for we got it for KD7.750 and the one he was asking KD 28 for we got it for KD14. My friend couldn't stop laughing at the way I bargain with them. But I think its fair. Coming for a business family and being the son of a business man I have learned a lot of good and bad secrets about business.
A quick one is when one of the big stores in the malls put 90% off trust me they are still making good profit out of it :) Good Day!
Comments
blue: Well we know before entering them that the price is fixed so we keep our mouth shut and just say WTF thats too expensive and leave :D
I know what you are talking about... same goes for the ma3areth el mojawharat when they come in once a year... I ask how much is this set of earings? He goes original price is 750, but I will give it to you for 400! I am like WHAT!!!! How much are they profiting when he pretend that he is dropping 350 before I even start to bargain! LOL
I ended up buying it for 250 ;-)
powder: thanks..enigma hates it!! hehe
now she doesnt read my blog anymore :(
on a side note I wish I could have a different color blog to make her feel better..
I just pay what they ask of me, say thank you, and leave!
shosho: you should visit it next time you are here!
lala: ahh you need to learn this art :P
outofreach: the word if i am not mistaken is 'kmti karoo' :D
And I have to say :p
I have a knack for bargaining ;p
I can keep a straight poker face ;p
but then yakser kha6ri and I pay him his original price , or shway aqal :p
Did you get them for half the price in the end? Did he buy your story that you found it somewhere else?
So what are the fourth language you speak? I know the three already- Arabic, English, Urdu. What about the last one? :)
In Qatar, we used to go to the camel races. I never even hear about them here in Kuwait. Are there camel races?
bombay bombshell: so who is hidden behind your real face!!! DEVIL :P
maya: The fourth is ...... laters :P *guess it*
intlxpatr: you can take some lessons from me :D...well I never heard they have camel races here!!
g and I: I had dinner few times there..not a big fan of the kabab they serve there:)
mirror: you should change :P
fa6ma: want some lessons I give them for free, hehe
takes time and effort.
oranjina: hehe its fun though you should give it a try!!
I don't have it unfortunately :(
well i went to this perfume market before to get one coz a friend of mine told me about it while we were "intimasha bsoog sla7" so i got one and i was so happy to get one for as i remember 18kd which ten kd less than real price
o marrat ilayyam
until my sis came to me to tell me that this perfume is a 'tester' but still untouched
i wondered before why it doesn't have any cover, but that explains it :D
but that's not the point it is the fact that i guess a tester will definitely be less than 90% off the price, don't you think so!
and yes i always have this urdo number argument it is very useful (learning the numbers in urdo is enough to bargain), but i usually show them that i understand what they had said although i roughly did coz i usually depend on the sound effect of their voices :)
but also persian is helping me but in shuwaikh (thanks to my friend) :) (takhfeef bida) o cham targee3a minneee minak :P
i believe that learning languages are the best ways to bargain really!
f: try it!! u will learn it soon..
deema: I need to learn persian too :) well let me tell you that usually testers are cheapest! If the perfume price is KD10 the tester wont be more than 5 or 6 KD...so be careful next time :P
E for effort, I guess.
I REALLY need to brush up on my Urdu...the only thing that has lasted is really bad swear words. Not so great when you're bargaining.
I thought the fourth was Persian for some reason. French?
chinese?! :P hehehe :P
nah.. Farsi!
Am i right? am i right? :P *jumps up and down, bouncing away with excitement*
maya: you still wont be able to guess it...it starts with S!
Wait.. Pick one!
1. Sabaean (Semitic) (extinct)
2. Salar (Turkic)
3. Samaritan Hebrew (Semitic) (extinct)
4. Samoan (Malayo-Polynesian)
5. Sandawe (Khoisan)
6. Sangisari or Sangesari (Iranian)
7. Sanglechi-Ishkashimi (Iranian)
8. Sango (Ngbandi-based creole)
9. Sanskrit (Indo-Aryan) (liturgical language)
10. Santali (Austro-Asiatic)
11. Sara (Malayo-Polynesian)
12. Saramaccan (English-based creole)
13. Sardinian (Romance)
14. Sarikoli (Iranian)
15. Saurashtra or Sourashtra (Indo-Aryan)
16. Savara (Dravidian)
17. Savi (Indo-Aryan)
18. Sawai (Malayo-Polynesian)
19. Scots (Germanic)
20. Scottish Gaelic or Scots Gaelic (Celtic)
21. Selangor Sign Language (Signing)
22. Selkup or Ostyak Samoyed (Samoyedic)
23. Selonian (Baltic) (extinct)
24. Semnani (Iranian)
25. Senaya (Semitic)
26. Sened (Berber) (extinct)
27. Senhaja de Srair (Berber) (extinct)
28. Sephardi Hebrew (Semitic)
29. Serbian (Slavic)
30. Serbo-Croatian (Slavic)
31. Sesotho (Bantu)
32. Seto or Setu (Finno-Ugric)
33. Seychellois Creole (French-based creole)
34. Shahrudi (Iranian)
35. Shimaore (Bantu)
36. Shina (Indo-Aryan)
37. Shona (Bantu)
38. Shor (Turkic)
39. Shughni (Iranian)
40. Shumashti (Indo-Aryan)
41. Shuswap (Salishan)
42. Sicilian (Romance)
43. Sidamo (Cushitic)
44. Sidetic (Anatolian) (extinct)
45. Sika (Malayo-Polynesian)
46. Silesian (Slavic)
47. Silt'e or Selti or East Gurage (Semitic)
48. Sindhi (Indo-Aryan)
49. Sinhalese (Indo-Aryan)
50. Sioux (Siouan)
51. Siraiki or Seraiki or Southern Punjabi (Indo-Aryan)
52. Sivandi (Iranian)
53. Skolt Sami (Finno-Ugric)
54. Slavey (Athabaskan)
55. Slovak (Slavic)
56. Slovenian or Slovene (Slavic)
57. Soddo or Kistane (Semitic)
58. Soi (Iranian)
59. Somali (Cushitic)
60. Sonjo or Temi (Bantu)
61. Sonsorolese or Sonsorol (Malayo-Polynesian)
62. Soqotri (Semitic)
63. Sora (Austro-Asiatic)
64. Sorbian, Lower (Slavic)
65. Sorbian, Upper (Slavic)
66. Sourashtra (Indo-Aryan)
67. Southern Sami (Finno-Ugric)
68. South Estonian (Finno-Ugric)
69. Southern Yukaghir or Tundra Yukaghir (Yukaghir)
70. Spanish (Romance)
71. Sranan Tongo (English-based creole)
72. St'at'imcets or Lillooet (Salishan)
73. Sucite or Sìcìté Sénoufo (Volta-Congo)
74. Suba (Bantu)
75. Sudovian or Yotvingian (Baltic) (extinct)
76. Sumerian (isolated) (extinct)
77. Sundanese (Malayo-Polynesian)
78. Supyire or Supyire Senoufo (Volta-Congo)
79. Surigaonon (Malayo-Polynesian)
80. Susu (Niger-Congo)
81. Svan (South Caucasian)
82. Swahili (Bantu)
83. Swati or Swazi or Siswati or Seswati (Bantu)
84. Swedish (Germanic)
85. Syriac (Semitic)
Sindhi? The thought crossed my mind but I just pushed it away thinking "nahh...." :P
How in the entire world did you learn that?! Apparently its a fast-dying language!