Friday, January 4, 2013

Lost at the mall: a tale of terror...

Day 1: "I think I'll go shopping" I said.  "It'll be fun" I said.  And now here I am, twelve hours later, and do you think I can find the way out?  Seriously, when did this place get so big?  And why the hell do I keep ending up in front of The Body Shop?  But I won't give up, the exit has to be around here somewhere.

Day 3:  The provisions ran out about half way through the first day.  I probably should have prepared better, but now I'm having to survive off vending machine snacks and half a Subway six inch I found abandoned on a bench.  But I'm not giving up, the exit has to be here somewhere!

Day 6:  It's been two days since I last saw a shop I recognise.  Oh, what I wouldn't give for a glimpse of and EB Games.  But no, I keep wandering past store after store with names I've never even heard of before.  How can there be so many shops I don't recognise?

Day 10:  I've now given up all hope of ever leaving this place.  If anyone finds this, use this log as a warning to others.  Sure you might think you're just popping into the shops for a quick half hour, but ten days later when you're resorting to drinking out of the decorative fountain in front of the information desk you'll realise just how wrong you were. 

Tell my family that I love them.

I'm used to being lost when I'm in the car, god knows I've spent enough time driving around in circles trying to work out how I got to where I was.  But  now I can't even find my way around in my local shopping complex?

I only popped in to check out a particular sale I was interested in, and if I'd stuck to going to that store and then back to my car I would have been just fine, but I had to get curious.  I had to decide to wander around a little to see if there were any other sales.  I had to go and get myself lost for three quarters of an hour!!!

Have any of you ever been lost in a shopping centre before?  You end up in this weird timeless zone, where it could be day or night or the zombie apocalypse out there and you'd never know.  I ended up wandering around, looking desperately for someone I could ask for directions, but the only person I found was a sales assistant in a clothing store who either didn't know how I could find the west entrance, or didn't care.

But eventually I found a familiar looking shop, which lead to another, which lead to the food court and to the exit closest to my car.  Thank god for that!  I don't think I could have survived on mall food for very long.

So learn from my experience, kiddies.  When you go to the mall, make sure you take a map ... or at least leave a trail of breadcrumbs so you can find your way out again.

55 comments:

  1. Oh you poor dear. Stay away from all mall mascots. Those big, fat, fluffy thangs are pervs I'm tellin' ya!!!!

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  2. The parking lot is my biggest challenge. I've taken 30 minutes to find the car before.

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    1. Oh god, the parking lot! I definitely lose all sense of direction as soon as I drive into one of them!

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  3. Now that is scary, and you've just given me my first New Year's resolution in over a decade: stay away from malls!

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  4. Hilarious though I'm sure it wasn't for you. It happened once at a Target I thought I was lost anyway. I kept walking in the opposite direction of the Target I was used to shopping in. Hubby said he was going to get me compass after that. Why can't they all look the same? :)

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    1. I always ask the same thing about supermarkets. Why can't they all have the tomato sauce in the same aisle? It's frustrating to go grab it only to be confronted by a wall of baked goods!

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  5. LOL! Haven't gotten lost in the mall, but I did forget where I'd parked once. Had to have mall security drive me around. I was sooo embarassed, and felt like a total dolt!

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  6. I'm there with you. Outdoors I'm fine....I can always figure out north, south, east, and west. But inside a mall with no windows I'm hopelessly lost.

    S

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    1. I'm an equal opportunity lost person, equally lost both inside and out :D

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  7. That's how they get you. The sadistic mall planners figure that if you keep wandering around, you'll buy more stuff. I'm afraid to say, I think it works...I stopped into a Target to buy Motrin and I came out with a t shirt, a pair of shoes, doggy treats, a duvet cover, mascara, mints and two magazines! You're right! It's scary out there!
    Connie*

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    1. LOL! Yep, that's probably their plan. Why else would they make the layout more complicated than an Egyptian tomb?

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  8. Malls are growing so huge these days that I think it would be easy to get lost. I've lost my car many times in mall parking lots.

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    1. Oh, I've done that too many a time. Mind you, I've also misplaced my car in side streets, train station parking lots, and on one memorable occasion, outside my friend's house.

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  9. Except for only having mall food, there's actually no reason to ever leave!!

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    1. True. And if there's a decent supermarket and a cooking store, I could probably make do.

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  10. Kellie! hahahaha, this post really cracked me up. I have a grand sense of direction. I have cousin that is disabled (from a childhood injury) and he has a tremendous sense of direction. He took my other cousin's sons in a little red wagon when they were 3 & 5 ALL the way across the city and returned them unharmed. AFTER the entire family at a reunion call the police and the fire department to locate them. Nobody could find them and 5 hours later he returns with the kids very red from sunburn but other wise unharmed. As you were relating your story of being lost in the Mall, that memory came to me. Mmmm, funny how that works?

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  11. Our mall is not overly large here, but have been in a few in my lifetime that were so big!! Had to take mental note of where I parked the car, what door I entered, upper level, lower level, what major department store, etc. They really can be a nightmare.

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    1. I have been known to quickly write down the names of the shops around the entrance I go in, so I don't get confused and leave through another and then spend hours looking for my car.

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  12. I ALWAYS forget where I parked the car. Then I wander around confused in the parking lot and start to worry that mall security will think I am casing cars to break into.
    I need some sort of homing device for my vehicle :)

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    1. That's why I picked the most garishly coloured car I could find. Sure it's pink, but I rarely have trouble finding it if it's anywhere near.

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  13. Yes! Oh I'm so glad I'm not the only one.. And then of course making your way through the mall maze only leads to the parking lot puzzle but I'm good once I hit fresh air!

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    1. I have just as many problems in the parking lot, but it doesn't stress me out anywhere near as much.

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  14. WOW, thanks for this warning Kellie, but no my "lost forever" problem is between Term 2 and 3 at Sydney airport!!......."follow the sign to Term 2" hahahahaha - yeah.....

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    1. I get lost in airports too, and I think Sydney is the worst!

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  15. I've been known to get lost in my oarents' four room flat. But I've kind of got used to never knowing where I am and tend to avoid shopping centres. A least they always have things to eat - not like being lost in the desert!

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    1. True, and toilet facilities, and beds if there is a bedding store!

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  16. It's not in the mall that I get lost, it's the trek through the 15 parking lots to find my one little white car that looks like all of the other little white cars. And just before I start to cry out loud that my car has been stolen, I turn around and there it is. I really think that little elves move my car around behind my back snickering!

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    1. Ah, that was your mistake, getting a white car. That's why I got a pink one the last time I bought a new car.

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  17. I've had that happen before, huge mall over 10 miles around with 6 or 8 floors to it
    took me an hour to find where my store was, 2 hours to reach it, 30 min to get what I wanted that apparently they were the only ones to have within several hours driving distance, and then I got lost and spent nearly 6 hours wandering the place trying to find an exit only to wind up on the opposite side of where I parked.

    In the end I almost wish I'd driven out of my way to someone else that had what I wanted. A few years later I started working there.

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    1. It's kind of scary how easy it is to get lost in those places. The really terrifying thing, though, is that it's a shopping centre I go to regularly. I should know my way around in there by now!

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  18. Ha!!! You need a "Galleria" Mall and then, you can just check in at the Hotel and stay the night (or two).

    Enjoyed... take care, Slu

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    1. Oh god, that sounds awful! I hate shops at the best of times, I certainly wouldn't want to sleep in one!

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  19. I got anxiety just thinking about this. Yes, of course I've gotten lost in a shopping center. Who hasn't? Liars who have been broken down by working in retail, that's who. Eventually, I'll just run screaming through an emergency exit. Maybe light a perfume pusher on fire, because no one needs a person surreptitiously spritzing humans with perfume, and the fire brings the fire department, and thus the glimmer of an exit.

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    1. That's a good plan! When the firemen turn up, you just run back to where they came from because that's where the exit has to be!

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  20. I love getting lost in the mall! It just means that I end up buying more stuff!! I LOVE STUFF!!

    Hugs!

    Valerie

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    1. LOL! As a fellow materialist, I can understand that. I just don't like shops :(

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  21. My favorite is when I stand in front of "my" car and push the remote key to open the doors only to find out that my actual car is 3 rows away...

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    1. That's why I bought a pink car! So much easier to find than one of the normal colours!

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  22. Crowded expansive spaces disorient me. Hard to explain, but I lose all my bearing and stand in the middle feeling one in 50,000.

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    1. Oh come now, don't underestimate yourself! I'm sure you're one in a million!

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  23. I hate shopping a LOT so I strategically map out my shopping expeditions and only get even slightly lost when my mother is involved cause she never remembers what store it was she wanted something from and will confuse it with twelve other stores first.

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    1. I do that too. I'm always wandering into a shop and asking for something they supposedly have on sale, only to be told that it's the other place that has that particular special. Very embarrassing!

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  24. Haha My worst is being lost (in any number of different shops) in the States. When you ask for directions the answer is always given in terms of compass directions, to wit: head south until ... then turn east.. etc. How on earth am I to know my north, south, east, etc, in the middle of a shopping centre? Or, more interestingly, how do any of them know where north is in the middle of the shopping centre?! But they all do :)

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    1. Huh, maybe they're all born with inbuilt compasses. I know I certainly wasn't though.

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  25. I am very directionally challenged! I go into a store in a mall and when I come out, I can't remember which way to turn to get back to where I was going. It is embarrassing! Glad you made it out alive!

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    1. It was a close call, but I somehow managed to make it out before sundown :D

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  26. That's the exact reason I decided to spend New Years on the farm no crowds (unless you count the sheep), no mad dash to the shops, no sales. Perfect!

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  27. I hear you :) I live fairly close The West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton - one of the biggest malls in the world and after eleven years, still get completely lost in it all the time. The thing I find most challenging about shopping is trying to remember where I parked my car...!!

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  28. Well, I don't get lost in the local mall, but the "Mall of Louisiana" in Baton Rouge is pretty big and I plot my walk from the car to the entrance when I go there.

    You aren't the only one...I understand panic time in a mall!

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  29. It's no good leaving breadcrumbs, you know. They come round and sweep them up!

    Malls are hideous places. We find ourselves doing pretty much anything these days rather than go there, but sadly there are things (like the only two types of bread I'm willing to eat these days) which are only available there. One just has to be brave!

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  30. May i just got a bundle of tips about online shopping, you going awesome and i want you to go ever best..
    Ainol tablet pc in pakistan

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