Observations at a Shopping Centre

The place is thick with the neon stench of socially acceptable prostitution. A smell so strong it can only be seen. It drips and pools like sticky piss, forming puddles, unbound by the laws of gravity, that move as though possessed of consciousness.

All this goes amazingly unnoticed by the horde of shoppers. Too much exposure to it has caused their eyes to be stunned, the pupils contracting to tiny points, closing off their ability to take in their atrocious surroundings.

Continued exposure over time leads to a dulling of the senses and, consequentially, a complete inability to take in anything real. At this point, the contraction of the pupils is reversed. This dilation, which gives the eyes an eerie, cartoonish appearance, signals the beginning of the permeation. First stealthy and then cloying, the strange sticky substance begins to seep in at the cracks, insinuating itself right down to the bones.

It seems that once it gets that deep, it’s got them. They’re inextricably hooked. Then the TV sets, shoes and two-for-one towel sets being pimped by shop assistants become important, necessary. They want things. They are made to realize that the reason they’re not happy is because they don’t have item x. With this realization comes the somewhat dubious discovery that happiness can be bought. So long as they remember to upgrade.

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Tags:

centre, consumerism, observation and shopping