The Mall vs. The Fayuca

In Puebla city there are two malls where your regular little rich kid or hijo de papi must be seen: the Triangulo de las Animas and the Centro Comercial Angelopolis .... these two are the fresa hang-out spots in town and both are supposedly lined out with only la creme de la creme in terms of boutiques, movie theaters, department stores, food courts, etc.

The first one was built quite recently (about 2 years ago!) and according to my hip 17 year old sister C, it is slightly cooler than Angelopolis. Personally though, I'd rather go to Angelopolis for sentimental reasons: they started building it back when I was in college and since campus was only a few blocks away, it used to be our hang out place even though back then there were only 3 stores and the Sanborn's open and the rest of the place was an empty ghost town...

Anyway, this past Friday we decided to go to Angelopolis to watch the movie Enchanted, and well..... let's just say that for being the creme de la creme, quality service left much to be desired....

First we get to the movie theaters and discover there is no subtitled version of Enchanted, only dubbed in Spanish. Since seeing any Disney movie dubbed is out of the question, we settled for the Golden Compass movie instead, so I go to the ticket counter to buy the tickets and this is how it goes:

Fned: "Hello, I'd like 4 tickets for the subtitled version of the Golden Compass starting at 12:30, please"
Ticket girl: "There is no movie playing at 12:30, the next subtitled version starts at 4:30pm"
Fned: "But I looked it up on the internet this morning and it said that there was a matinee playing at 12:30"
Ticket girl: (looking bored) "Oh those things are never up to date. Here's this morning's paper, you can check what else is playing right now if you'd like"
Fned: (scanning the paper)... "Oh good! You're right, there isn't a 12:30 show but there is a subtitled one of the Golden Compass playing at 1pm... I'd like to buy 4 tickets for that one please"
Ticket girl: (grudgingly typing on her computer)... "that's probably a mistake, my screen is not showing that time, the next subtitled show is at 4:30pm"
Fned: "well can you ask someone and make sure? I'd hate to miss the movie it if is playing"
Ticket girl: (now clearly angry at this pesty gringa holding up the line)... "Pablo! This lady (!!!) here says there's a 1pm show for the Golden Compass but my screen is showing nothing before 4:30
Pablo: "oh there is a 1pm show"
Fned: "there is?!"
Pablo: "sure, it's in Spanish and everything"
Fned: (stepping out of the line and going to consult with the others) "Guys, we're out of luck, there isn't a 12:30 show and the next subtitled one is this afternoon"
Minshap: "Well, that's strange! The cartelera up there shows a subtitled version playing at 2pm! How can that be?!" ZONK!

We decide to forget about the movie all together and head to Mixup Music store down the hall from the movie theaters. This place used to be the reference when you wanted to find any and every CD available. So we get there and I head over to the place where they have listening booths of the Top 20 selling albums of the week. My eyes spot a booth with "Jazz and the 80's Volume II" and I decide to check it out. And this goes something like this:

Fned: "hmmmmm, I wonder what 'should I stay or should I go' all jazzed up sounds like" so I hit Play on Track 1.
..... suddenly some chick starts singing something about Holding back the years and after 1 minute into the song there's still no sign of that funky should I stay or should I go verse!
Fned: "hmmm this is weird, maybe I don't know the words to the song right... let's try Madonna's 'Like a Virgin', I always loved that song...." Hit play on Track 9
.... this time I know there's something funny going on.... Like any 20 something year-old I know my Madonna and there is definitely not a single "rat in my kitchen" verse in Like a Virgin....
It takes me a moment to realize that while the track list shows the songs for the "Jazz and the 80's Volume II"CD, somebody must have put the disk of "Jazz and the 80's Volume I" in the CD player!!

Pffffff.... ok, ok, so anyone can a make a mistake right? So I look for a vendor to let him know about this and also to see if there is any way I can listen to either Volumes with their appropriate track list. But when I mention this to a guy wearing that blue Mixup shirt he only looks at me as if I'm crazy and shrugs his shoulders (either because he couldn't care less or because he doesn't know) and walks away!

After this, we decide we're done with the Mall and head out to the Fayuca to check out and see if we can find anything interesting to watch (since clearly going to the movies is out of the picture!)

Now, for those of you who don't know what the Fayuca is, imagine a busy and hectic open market, filled with clandesting shops and people selling food on the sidewalk... at the Fayuca one can find pretty much anything, from cheapie Louis Vuitton imitation bags all the way to 80 pesos pirate DVD's of the entire Season 1 of Friends... all under one huge and clandestine roof!



I know, not very ethical of us but we were only responding in true Capitalism form which is that if you don't take care of your clients then they will seek better customer service elsewhere... and after the mall experience, the fayuca became "elsewhere"

And sure enough, this is how it went:
Minshap: "Hello, we're looking for Enchanted in english"
Fayuca vendor: "Sorry mam, that movie has only come out in spanish in Mexico so far, but we can have it for you by the end of January"
Minshap: "oh, ok, well in that case we'll take the three Jason Bourne movies, do you have 'em?"
Fayuca vendor: "sure! here you go"
Minshap: "do you mind putting them in your DVD set just to make sure the quality of the movie is good?"
Fayuca vendor: "no problem miss..." plays one by one all the DVDs and sure enough the pirate quality is astonishing...
Minshap: "I'm also looking for Season 2 of Friends, would you happen to have it?"
Fayuca vendor: "sure, I'll go check with my cousin a few shops away, can you wait?"
Minshap: "no problem"
Sure enough, 10 minutes later he's back with Friends 2 under his arm

We pay him and thank him and 15 minutes later we're walking back to the car highly satisfied and with exactly what we asked for.

Now, it shouldn't be a surprise that on a scale of 1 through 10 I'd rate the high posh Malls' quality service at about 2 and the Fayuca's at around 9.

Does this sound even remotely logical to any of you??

Fned.