While in India, shopping is something I do as a last resort. Either because I have run out
of something and can't proceed any further without it or because someone wants me to
buy something. I hate the crowds at the shopping centres, I hate the lack of parking and
the actual shopping experience is also nothing much to talk about. So, I stay away, unless
I have no options.
But the moment I am in a foreign country, I change into an avid shopper. I am on the
lookout for shops that have local souveniers that I can gift people back home. Or for
chocolates for the kiddies back home. Or I check out specific gifts for people like digicams
or watches etc. I also shop for dresses for my nieces. In short, I love shopping when I am
outside India. Ofcourse, the Japanese shopping experience has not been that much fun due
to not knowing local language and also due to them labelling most of the stuff in Japanese.
I love the way business is done in the US and Europe. You go to a shop, they have all the
models displayed, with the price alongside. You check out the product that best matches
your requirements and buy the one that has the price which you think is right. And, to top
it, we have the online versions of their shops, where you can browse from home, see the
various options available, zero-in on the correct match and just go get it from the shop.
Contrast this with the Indian shopping experience. Online retailing, while it surely is catching
up, is nowhere near the BestBuy.com or CircuitCity.com experience. And the actual brick-and-mortar shops display only a few models, limiting your choice. Prices might or might not be tagged on the products. In short, its not a fun experience zero-ing in on the product of your choice.
One inconvenience though, of shopping abroad is the difference in rates of the currency used
for trade in the country you visit and the one in your country. This requires quite some quick mental calculations to ensure that the price indicated on the product in local currency is infact
a good deal when converted to your currency (Indian Rupee a.k.a INR in my case).
While in the US, this would require me to multiply the price by 45 (1$ was equal toRs.45 in 2005 when I was last in the US - today it is only Rs40). So you find the right product and
then need to do some quick calculations so as to compare with the price you would pay in
India for the same or equivalent product. Or if it is something that is not available in India,
you would still need to convert it to rupees to be sure that it is worth the money and also in some cases to ensure that it falls in the budget you have in mind for that product.
In Japan, its the other way round. The INR is stronger than the Yen, and 1 rupee equals
3 Yen, and so here you need to divide the price in Yen by 3. Comparitively easier and faster than multiplying random numbers with 45.
So, for Indians shopping abroad, it mostly involves multiplication because except for a few currencies like the Japanese Yen, most currencies are stronger than the INR. And while the
fact that the INR is weaker might seem a weakness, the business community, especially the exporters from India, would prefer to have it that way. Already, with the rupee appreciating
in value against the dollar, we have all our software majors crying out loud - it hurts their bottom line you see.
For every $ worth of export, instead of Rs45 that they were getting till recently, they are
now getting only Rs40. Imagine the reduction in revenue (in INR) for a firm that exports,
say 1billion dollars worth of software or software services a year. A straight reduction of
5 billion INR from their revenue. No wonder the Premji's and Nilekani's of the Indian
software industry are making a big noise about the appreciating rupee.
Anyway, getting back to the original topic of this post, the one place where I could shop
without multiplying or dividing the price in local currency to arrive at the equivalent in
INR, was Belgium, in the pre-Euro period. The Belgium Franc (BEF) had a value almost
same as the INR. So if the price tag of that nice French wine I was checking out, read as
950 BEF, it meant that it is also 950INR. No division, no multiplication, no nothing. Just
plain and simple hassle-free shopping.
Maybe one day, there will be only one currency for the world. That does sound like a fun situation, and not just for shoppers in foreign countries. It would surely make life easy for
lots of people - no exchanging currency on landing at a foreign place, no carrying around
banknotes or coins of different countries.
Ofcourse, I don't think people who make a living out of the existence of different currencies (forex dealers, traders etc) would be too happy about this.
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