Shopping is better than sex. If you’re not
satisfied after shopping, you can make an exchange for something you really
like,” said New York-based writer Adrienne Gusoff.
Shopping
is better than sex.
The psychology of shopping is often likened
to sex (“It gives instant gratification”), or explained anthropologically
(“It’s a ritual in which the wallet gets mutilated”), but very little has been
written that recognizes shopping as one of the most important sociological
phenomena of the last two centuries.
Ever since the days when traders would
exchange necessities with neighboring communities, travel and shopping have
gone hand in hand. Modern civilization today is characterized as much by the
dynamics of shopping as it is by the politics of the region. These days, a
nation’s worth is defined not just by its sightseeing appeal, but by the value
of the products on its shelves. The success of city-nations like Singapore,
Dubai and Abu Dhabi has made retail the cornerstone on which entire countries
are built; shopping is now a cultural experience. How we shop, where we shop
and how far we are willing to travel to shop is redefining our economic
stature, as it is re-imagining our cultural identity.
Shopping
is now a cultural experience
Today, mega-stores look like modern-day
temples – marbled doors, stained-glass windows, cathedral-like columns, but
they also serve as jiffy cultural reservoirs – places where you can participate
in pottery-making, tea ceremonies, watch piano recitals or foreign films, or
merely run to for respite from daily drudgery in the form of an exotic coffee.
Not only is shopping shaping cities, it’s
also shaping us as travellers. Not long ago, hoarding gold in the Godrej
almirah was the average Indian family’s savings plan; credit cards were
distrusted, holidays were to our native place, and Schezwan chicken was as far
as we would venture into foreign cuisine. But with the opening up of our
economy, our wallets grew fatter, and our travel plans became more exotic. This
generation, a huge band of the workforce often likened to the baby-boomers of
America, is making seismic changes to our consumption patterns, both in India
and beyond.
Not
only is shopping shaping cities, it’s also shaping us as travellers.
About 1.2 crore Indians travel overseas
every year – and not on shoe-string budgets either. Since it’s almost always a
family holiday, they travel in packs and but for friends and families, large
families. As per a survey by AC Nielsen, Indians are among the fastest-growing
spenders in the world (in London, we’ve edged out the Japanese). Dubal,
Singapore and Malaysia are the regular shopping hotspots, with 30 percent of
spending in duty-free at those airports done by Indians last year. Add to this
big destination weddings, and shopping is paddling pockets all the way from
Prague to Bali.
But behind all this conspicuous consumption
is a growing quest for ‘experiential shopping,’ which involves curiosity about
the history and idiosyncrasies of a place. More and more Indians are seeking
out far-flung destinations and taking an interest in local crafts and
traditions.
Add
to this big destination weddings, and shopping is paddling pockets all the way
from Prague to Bali.
This shift in perception involves buying
into cultures and experiences, however obscure. Chinese brocades, Arabic spices
and Tanzanian kanga cloth – these are the travel riches of a culturally-evolved
aficionado, one who squirms at the thought of a globalized, homogenized
shopping experience.
My friend Adam Levin, who wrote The Art of
African Shopping, advises: “If we wish to savor the mysteries of this great
land mass, we must explore the universal language of the senses. We must read
with nimble fingertips, listen with deep ears and sniff with wide nostrils.”
And, perhaps, shop with conscience and curiosity in equal measure.
