panic-buying

to normal people, it's panic-buying. to me, it was getting things over and done with.

i had always wanted to go to divisoria but never had a strong reason to... so since wedding favors are a strong enough reason, i dragged my mom and aunt there today.

we left the car in the 1st parking lot we found, which was all the way in sto. cristo street, and walked the rest of the way. we found ourselves in the tela district - where rows upon rows of lace ribbons, zippers, fabrics, and threads were everywhere. we finally stopped in one store which had the exact shade of pink that the maid of honor needed. 15 yards of panic-buying later, we were at the next-door store where more ninang fabrics were. this next-door shop carried good finds - what would normally be sold at carolina's or castle for P800 was only sold for P220 here! now who wouldn't go into a state of panic?

since we already had enough fabrics to clothe the whole clan, we went to tabora street - where we were really supposed to go anyway. oddly enough, it was like being back in pratunam and sampaeng lane all over again - only this time, i understood the conversations around me. i thought that stores were there, but to my surprise bangketa tents lined the street. we stopped at one bangketa store that sold glass jars with air-tight lids - exactly what i was looking for. they were initially selling it for P25, but i brought down the price to P19 since i was getting 130 pieces... so the manong went to get the stock in their bodega somewhere. unfortunately, they only had 40 pieces of it left, so i opted for a similar jar to fill in the balance. 30 minutes later, we were still there, waiting for them to pack and complete my order. getting impatient with the people we were talking with, my mom got into mataray-mommy-mode and asked the tindera why she was counting it over and over again. tindera suddenly snaps into snooty-owner mode and says that manong-husband is tanga and that the jars will not be given to us at P19 (while telling her assistants to stop packing the jars kasi malulugi lang sila).

after 30 freaking minutes of packing, deciding, and counting.

my mom and aunt, by this time, were already too annoyed to argue. so we left snooty-tindera and her bewildered tanga husband to their 130 jars.

fortunately, a few meters down the road was an old man selling those dust-gathering wedding souvenirs and paper mache boxes. he was jolly and kind, and the boxes he sold were the perfect size.

see, everything happens for a reason.

only thing is, he only had 88 pieces of the size we wanted. we got them anyway, and bout 50 of a smaller size. will think of a good excuse for that one later on.

by this time, we didn't have enough adrenalin to go to ilaya street. we all decided we had accomplished enough, and went home.

it was a hot day for outdoor shopping, but a happy one to get a few things over and done with. next on the to-do list: box stickers or ribbons.

weddings talaga... they either bring out the crappiest, most creative, most mushy, or most OC behavior in you.