Shopping is even less fun now

We were never big mall people, but now, going to the shops is even less fun because we have no idea what anything is. Gareth biked to work today and left me the car so that I could stock up on work-wardrobe essentials: a new suit, maybe a few tops, some pantyhose. But where the heck do I buy pantyhose in Christchurch?

There is no Target. There is Kmart, but it's just as gross as American Kmart. (Thankfully, there is no Wal-Mart.) There are department stores, but it's not clear yet which ones are like Macy's or Nordstrom and which ones are more like Sears or JCPenney. There is no Gap, no Banana Republic, and (gasp!) no Ann Taylor. As an uninventive shopper who bought 95% of my clothes at these three stores, I'm now at a loss.

Walking through the Riccarton mall is completely bewildering. So many shops and no idea what any of them are selling, whether it's quality stuff, cheap stuff, or cheap stuff that's overpriced. This is a sampling of the stores to choose from for women's fashion:
Cue Design
David Lawrence
Dotti
Lippy (what?)
Jacui E
Postie Women
Veronika Maine
...
The list goes on, with only shop standing out as one I've at least heard of before: Espirit. I wandered around in a daze, and then finally went into Cue Design. This had nice looking suits in shades of gray and brown. One wall was 50% off, but I soon discovered that fifty percent off of way too much is still quite a lot.

I think at least I've got the new sizing down. New Zealand sizes are like UK sizes - just add four, so an American size 8 is a New Zealand size 12. Easy enough. But somehow, buying clothes with bigger numbers on the tags is kind of demoralising.

We have heard other immigrants complain that there is not enough choice here - because the population is so small, there just isn't the same wide selection of goods on offer. We ran into this over the weekend when looking for a neon yellow reflector jacket for Gareth to wear on his bike. One bike speciality store had two jackets to choose from. The next one had the same two. The third store had the same two again. We finally got one. This really isn't that big of a deal though - how many kinds of neon yellow reflector jackets do you really need? No more than two, surely.