Fabric Market

I went with a friend to have some sheets adjusted, and it brought back fond memories of my first week in China. Chinese say that foreigners are large and very round (my teacher compared my eyes to Thomas the Tank Engine!), but I think mine were especially that shape my first week here because everything was so new and different.

One of my first experiences was buying custom-made sheets for my bed. K brought me to this place, and I looked through spool after spool of fabric, and, after deciding which one I wanted, bargained with the seller. Er, K bargained for me, since my Chinese was limited to about 2 words at that point.

After buying the material, for the equivalent of about $10, we walked around the corner, where 5 women waited for sewing jobs. We took the material up to one of the seamstresses, and K explained the dimensions of the sheets. The woman didn't seem too pleased, and after a short conversation, K turned to translate back to me. She said the woman thought it was a hassle to sew a fitted sheet, and this would cause it to take longer and gave her a reason to charge more. The amount of time? An hour and a half. The cost? 20¥, or just under $3 U.S. Expecting her to state a much higher cost and amount of time, I happily handed over the money, and a couple hours later, picked up my new sheets!

some women looking at sample sheet patterns