Passenger Talesstories about my experiences as a traveler and passenger

Last Friday was the opening of SM Marikina. Traffic was so heavy along Marcos Avenue and you could see a lot of people within the vicinity of SM Marikina. Usually between 4:30pm to 5:00pm traffic is not heavy from Katipunan to Sta. Lucia but because of the opening we got caught in traffic. Weeks before the opening all of us riding in the service were kidding around that we’d all troop to SM City Marikina during the opening. Good thing we did not do so because just from the highway you can already see how crowded the mall was. Even the overpass to SM was very crowded and it spilled on to the streets. I have never been to an opening of a mall or department store so I did not know that it could get like that. My office mates told me that there are a lot of freebies and discounts during openings hence the presence of the multitude of people.

During our conversations about mall openings, particularly SM malls, I realized that there are people who make a habit of going to mall openings. I was playing around with the idea that there might be a group of die hard SM malls fans who always get together and attend SM mall openings. Maybe they have an organization and and a blog forum where they schedule their EBs and get togethers to coincide with a mall opening or something. Hehe.

Talking about mall openings, I remember that I read an article that when IKEA, the big Scandinavian store, opens a branch there are long lines of people waiting outside. Some even wait in line as early as three days before the store opening. Talk about excited.

It’s really sad that we have to be always on guard about our belongings. Nothing is ever safe from quick fingers.

Earlier while I was in Megamall, I had two slightly embarrassing experiences. If I reacted to them then it could have been a lot more embarrassing. The first one happened in one of the restrooms. I was washing my hands (this sounds familiar?) and I had to reached out to get soap from the liquid dispenser. The girl beside me was combing her hair when she involuntarily raised her hand in the act of getting her cellphone that she placed in the sink in front of her when she saw me reach for the soap dispenser near her cellphone. I just ignored what could have been an insult because you can’t be too careful nowadays. I would have done the same thing in her place. I acted as if I did not see what she did and when I glanced at her casually after that without making any eye contact, I saw that she had on a sheepish grin. Good thing I don’t get insulted easily I think she was more embarrassed than I was.

The second incident happened in Sari-Sari. While waiting for my friend Beth to arrive, I tried on a blouse that I fell in love with and decided to buy it. When I got out of the fitting room, I saw that Beth had already arrived. So I went to the cashier to pay for my purchase. It was somewhat a slow transaction that when I looked around for Beth, I could no longer see her at the store. When I finished with my transaction, I walked to the door to look for her. Before I could get out of the store, the scanner sounded. It was quite a loud, annoying buzzing sound that people turned to look. I knew that it had to do with my purchase so I gave the paper bag containing the blouse and the receipt to the guard who was approaching. He was puzzled as he took the bag and saw that there was a receipt already. He took it back to the cashier. There, the two ladies who assisted me looked sheepish and very apologetic because they forgot to take off the scanning apparatus (is that the right term?) when they released the item to me.