Sunday November 18, 2012

To buy or not to buy? Happiness is the real question

HAVE you been shopping lately? We are truly spoilt for choice considering the number of shopping malls that seem to spring up every now and then.

I have this sneaky suspicion that all the shop attendants in the Klang Valley know that I am not a real shopper, and that they should not really waste their time with me.

Even when it comes to the basic necessities, like a new pair of pants or a shirt, I would hover around the store, look at one or two items, and then decide to let my better half buy for me on another day instead.

But I do like to check out the stores that sell electronic devices like the huge 3-D TV sets and home theatre systems and spend some time there pretending that I am a serious customer.

The reality check is that such huge, expensive devices will never make it into my home.

But what about the really high-end shopping? In the malls, there are very exclusive shops where I often wonder who their clients might be. These are the shops where the standing rule is that if you have to ask about the price, you probably cannot afford it.

A friend who works in such a shop was telling a group of us, over teh tarik, that it was quite a revelation to him that there are many people who can afford the very high-end stuff.

Taking care not to reveal their identities, he described how these clients would walk into the shop, already knowing what they want to buy, and would whip out their cheque books or credit cards to pay for the deposits.

“How much?” we asked in unison. “Let me put it this way, just the deposit alone would be enough to pay for the luxury car that is parked over there,” he said.

Our friend then went on about how the shop assistants are trained to assess the potential customer’s worth simply by looking at the watch he wears.

“When we are not sure, we just Google for the information. The other day, I checked out a customer’s watch and learnt that it cost nearly RM300,000,” he said. We all nearly choked on our teh tarik.

Bearing in mind that we all used to work in the same environmental organisation for “a low salary and a nice, warm feeling”, there was no need to prolong that conversation.

It is not easy to define “rich” these days. Those of us who started out in the workforce back in the early 1980s used to declare that we would be satisfied once we earned a “four-figure” salary. And that being able to change our Honda Cub to the cheapest car available, second-hand at that, was enough.

Young people today desire the best, simply because parents are prepared to “finance” their de-mands.

Even young children are given expensive gadgets on their birthdays before they turn 10.

As my colleague, Cheryl Poo, shared in a column in StarBizWeek, these are the parents who pander to their children’s every whim and whine before teaching them the value of deservedness.

There are many things that money can buy, depending on one station’s in life. There are also many things that money cannot buy – time, love, relationships, values – that are available freely and fairly to everyone. The choice is ours to make.

> Deputy executive editor Soo Ewe Jin is reminded that the best birthday gift for a young child is to make him a playhouse out of a discarded cardboard box. Costs nothing, but priceless.

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Sunday November 18, 2012

To buy or not to buy? Happiness is the real question