Today I went to an outlet store in Las Vegas. This has been a big area full of shops, mostly clothing, similar to a mall, just without roof. So actually many little buildings organized in a way that you can’t get out, once in the labyrinth of shops. There have been all the famous companies and every label had its own shop.

I would have been very exited if I would have liked shopping clothes. But since I was there, I went through the labyrinth and checked out one or another shop. But unfortunately many other people had a similar idea. So it was pretty crowded, which resulted into some interesting group dynamics. First of all, people don’t walk in a comprehensive pattern. Shopping people walk completely unpredictable. They change directions in unforeseeable ways, just like that. They suddenly stop without warning or accelerate. It is almost impossible to predict the path of the surrounding humans when walking through the scene. This is a complex dynamic system.

Even more complicating becomes the exercise with all the fixed obstacles and barriers. There are garbage cans, billboards, even trees. Not to speak from relocatable objects like dogs. This is very confusing and requires top focus. You have no idea, shopping is such a pain and frustrating. Why do people do this? They call it shopping experience, I call it limbo or pre-hell.

Okay, but that’s not all yet. Some people even try to talk to you, well to me. Which is in general a good thing. Communication is a nice invention and prevents us from arguing with clubs. Unfortunately this conversation is rather one-sided. They want to sell you something you don’t need and you try to say politely: ‘get lost!’. If you are the more tolerant type, you can handle those situations for a while and keep smiling. But at some point even the more patient contemporary becomes a bit snappy.

For me it was the Jamaican guy who pulled me across that line. Well it was most probably an American who looked very Jamaican. A big guy, fit and strong, darker skin and rasta hair cut. A real sunny boy. He stopped me and tried to sell me a power wristband, one which gives me energy and balance and many other advantages. He even promised better sex and better sleep. I was tempted to answer: “Wait a minute, isn’t this mutual exclusive?!”. But he kept praising his power wristband. I was nice and explained that I had already such a thing and it didn’t work too well. But this didn’t stop his monologue and encouraged him even more. Okay, last chance: cliche. I tried to look as serious as possible and looked through my sun glasses into his and said: “I don’t believe in your voodoo”. Then I realized that it was not the most brilliant idea to call a Jamaican guy doing voodoo, especially not if this guy is much stronger than yourself. Luckily I had the element of surprise at my side since the facial expression of the guy collapsed. Obviously he had not expected such a comment. He was observably not amused. Okay, such a moment needs be used and I added that I do not want his placebo bracelet. This didn’t ease up the situation much. So I went away before he could decide to break my arm.
And suddenly this shopping tour got an interesting touch 😉