Shopping Injuries

You know you have a serious shopping habit when you wake up sore the next day! My shoulders, my neck, my arms, my back, my hands, they're all aching.

I went to my favourite antique flea market yesterday. I'm working on buying as much as I can with the possibility that we may be moving back to Australia next year. I have the flea market down to a fine art now. If I am lucky enough to have the same day off from work that the flea market falls (twice a month), I make sure to go. My husband drops me off at the train station on his way to work, so I get there nice and early before the crowds. I have my favourite sellers and now go around the market in accordance to who I like to buy what from. By nine-ish, I've usually done the market and head off for breakfast. There is a little cakeshop near-by that offers a choice of tea or coffee and a buffet of different bread, sandwiches, boiled eggs and cake for under $4. Just before 10, the first second-hand store opens and I visit a few of them until 10.30 when my favourite one opens. By 10.25, I'm lined up outside that store with a lot of mostly women, ready to fight the crowd, with my 100yen coin ready for the locker to put my morning purchases in. In the shop, I even have my pattern figured out. Children's kimonos first, then obi, followed by kimono, then haori and lastly the accessories. By the time I've then sorted through my purchases, an hour has flown by. I'm then out of there, go back through the market in the temple grounds to pick up heavy purchases I've left behind.

I struggle to the subway station with a large tote on one shoulder, a smaller on the other, a small bag with wheels being dragged with one hand and two large shopping bags in the other. I have to stop a number of times in the short distance because of the weight of it all.

Last month, I took the lift down to the subway station, knowing that I couldn't tackle the stairs. A sweet old woman in her 70s started a conversation and commented on all the bags I had. I agreed and told her how heavy they were. When the lift door opened she took the wheelie bag out of my hands and helped me with my parcels. I couldn't believe I had bought so much that I needed a little old lady to help me carry my shopping! Yesterday, of course she wasn't there and I really wished she had been.