Posting pants India style

Well this was an interesting experience for my first day in Delhi. Josh (Louise's boyfriend) had a couple of things he needed to do, and I thought I would tag along. His main task was to buy 20 pairs of pants for a woman he met in Denmark. The best place was at one of the local markets.

Arriving at the local market, it took a while for everything to get rolling. Most of the shops were not yet open, so we waited around drinking chai and discussing the meaning of life. When the market was showing a lot more life and most of the shops were open, we went searching for the pants. I wasn't sure what he was after, but eventually he found (kinda) what he was looking for, and started negotiating with the shop owner. The technique of bargaining was different from what I was use to in China. We went in confidently, sat down in the shop, and were given another cup of chai from the owner. Josh explained to me, in Indian culture they see the customer as God. Indians are a very welcoming people and will invite you into their place and take care of you. So we were drinking chai and choosing the pants that we thought a Danish woman would like, without even talking about the price. I asked why he hadn't discussed price. Josh assured me we would do business with this man, and he would give a decent price. This to me was pretty silly way of bargaining. It's a mistake to show too much interest before you have negotiated a price. The shop keeper new that Josh would be buying from him, so why would he give a really good price? Anyway, Josh has had a lot of experience in India, and on top of that speaks pretty good Hindi, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. But he did pay a lot more then he expected

After making the purchase, our next task was to post the thing. I learnt, for a parcel to be sent by India Post it has to be sewn together. That's right, not packed into a box like everyone else, but rapped in fabric and stitched together. They don't accept anything else, don't ask me why. So we had to find a 'packer', someone whose job it is to sew parcels together for people. Nobody at the market seemed to have any idea where we could find such a person. We spent along time being sent back and forth between shops. People would be like "try shop bla bla" (in Hindi), so we would go there. And they would be like "Go to shop bla bla bla". Eventually Josh realise he was asking the wrong question, and asked for a tailor. If anyone could do it, a tailor could. We found one soon after, and he assured us he was the man for the job (well the boy for the job). The older man then took us to buy some material from the local fabric shop. We chose minimalist white. The end product was not too dissimilar from a white pillow. Josh assured me this is what they want - no more, no less.

At the post office, of course no body has a permanent marker, so I ran back to the market to get one. Josh in the mean time had walked around the back of the counter in the staff area. He later said that if you are confident no one will question you. But still, I don't know if I could just walk into a post office and go straight behind the counter. Anyway, it was finally all sorted out, apart from the fact that the post worker thought that only a maximum of 2KG is allowed to be sent by surface mail. Airmail on the other hand could handle more - go figure.

The parcel was sewn, labeled (with a permanent marker), and weighed. The only thing left was the custom declaration. How they think they can glue a piece of paper to a fabric covered parcel, without it falling off in transit, is beyond me. But Josh said, "did you see what I did? I shook the man hand, and he told me not to worry, the parcel will make it, he'll make sure it does. I guess that's India for you.