I went to college in an idyllic spot in the US (otherwise known as the boonies), and never hung out in malls; there were none in rural Vermont. But at about the same time that I was engaging in the state's most popular pastime — cow tipping — a giant billboard went up on the interstate highway between St. Paul and Minneapolis. The billboard showed Da Vinci's enigmatic Mona Lisa smiling upon the passing traffic. Except she didn't look particularly enigmatic, her famous "is-it-a-smile?" expression had been replaced by a happy, toothy grin. The caption read: "She's been to the Mall of America". Many social commentators saw it as the abrogation of culture in favour of the new god of consumerism.
Karachi's new malls are a far cry from the Mall of America (that mall boasts bigness: 140,000 hot dogs sold each week, 10,000 permanent jobs, 44 escalators, 17 elevators, 12,750 parking spaces, 13,300 short tons of steel, $1 million in cash disbursed weekly from 8 automatic teller machines, 4.2 million square feet of floor space and more than 400 purveyors of merchandise, food and entertainment). But are they too selling the same message: the pursuit of modern happiness ends at the mall?
Park Towers, Karachi's first slick mall, is a natural magnet for many young people. Teens from all parts of the city seem to flock there — gaggles of giggly girls walk past me, all in tiny t-shirts and low-slung jeans, all busy talking into little pastel cell phones. Across the atrium, a posse of boys, long hair peaking out of baseball caps that hide their eyes, check out the girls, who giggle some more. Hmmm mall rats meet cool cats?
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Posted by: Fred ||
03/26/2005 00:00:00 AM ||
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#1
When you read the things that the elite of Karachi and Lahore write about, you wouldn't think they were living on the same planet as their countrymen.
Posted by: Paul Moloney ||
03/26/2005 2:56 Comments ||
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#2
In The Peoples' Republic of Davis, CA, we've long had a majority against growth (read malls and new housing). As a result, boutiques peddle overpriced trinkets in overly high-rent shops. Until the Gottshalks store arrived, you had to drive 10 miles to Woodland to buy socks and underwear. Screw the Utopians; they're the ones who are tenured at the UC and have no clue about life without an Ivory Tower, especially WRT tipping the local service industry. Many of them have housing dividends and don't have to bother with the inflated market prices dictated by their very presence and support of Slow Growth.
Ah, the small joys of spitting in a Tweed Coat's Rob Roy....
Posted by: Armchair in Sin ||
03/26/2005 12:15 Comments ||
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#3
All that's missing is 'a filthy, ostentatious display of bourgeois capitalist decadence' to round out the Marxist message.
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I went to college in an idyllic spot in the US (otherwise known as the boonies), and never hung out in malls; there were none in rural Vermont. But at about the same time that I was engaging in the state's most popular pastime — cow tipping — a giant billboard went up on the interstate highway between St. Paul and Minneapolis. The billboard showed Da Vinci's enigmatic Mona Lisa smiling upon the passing traffic. Except she didn't look particularly enigmatic, her famous "is-it-a-smile?" expression had been replaced by a happy, toothy grin. The caption read: "She's been to the Mall of America". Many social commentators saw it as the abrogation of culture in favour of the new god of consumerism. 
