57
Keith Morrison
author and educationist
kmorrison@iium.edu.mo
Clouds and silver linings
Are there any benefits from the downturn in name luxury goods are concerned, seems to have given way
the economy? Not many, but maybe just one
to a realisation that, in fact, these are dispensable though not
or two. Have you noticed how much more
disposable assets. They are trinkets, with little value or worth
when times are hard.
the customer has been put first by banks
To quote Shakepeare’s Othello, maybe it makes such
and investment companies, eager to keep
shoppers realise that they may have ‘loved not wisely but too
your confidence (and your money), and, of
well’. i am repeatedly astonished at the gullibility of brand-
course, your business? They telephone you
chasers in Macau. after all, a shirt is a shirt is a shirt; shoes are
only shoes; a bag is a bag. Get real.
in the politest possible and most reassuring The downturn in the economy seems to have brought a new
tones to try to sell you capital-protected
sense of service and realism to Macau’s service providers and
investments, to let you know that their bank
shoppers respectively. What a pity that this has come at the
cost of jobs for its residents. Up-market restaurants are almost
or organisation is the safest in the world, and
empty, shops have closed, and people cannot find jobs.
that nothing is too much trouble for them. all over the world the downturn in employment prospects is
giving rise to increasing numbers of youth staying at school or
HaT a change from the days when they were in going to university. in Macau this is surely a good thing.
the driving seat and the customer had to accept it The allure of easy money from casino work took many students
as a privilege to put money with those same banks (and their teachers) out of schools and universities in Macau.
and to be pushed around by them. You would be if one looks at the employment figures from the time of the
permitted to have a wry smile were it not for the fact that it does opening up of the casino industry, the trend is clear: after an
not exonerate banks from misusing your money, their greed, initial dip, young people were going into employment in their
opportunism, or, put more simply, bad practice. droves, often low-skill, dead-end jobs that paid reasonably, until
Have you noticed how much more polite and accommodating the downturn in 2008.
Macau’s shopkeepers
have become, now that
they need your business?
Before the downturn
you sometimes had to
press them to show you
anything at all or even to
let you enter the shop if it
was nearly closing time,
and you had to put up
with their rough manner.
Now nothing is too much
trouble for them and, yes, they will parade endless supplies of Even though the Macau government has taken steps to
stock before your eyes. You want us to stay open whilst you stem this, raising the age for working in casinos, it seems
finish shopping? Of course, madam. What an indictment of to take a downturn in the economy to bring people to their
materialist behaviour when even good manners become a senses and realise that, in fact, education might just be a
commodity to be traded. good thing.
Have you noticed how the high-end brand it is timely to look again at one’s values.
goods shops no longer have burly guards is there a new sense of realism replacing
keeping you waiting in an orderly queue at materialism in Macau? i hope so. is it the
the door, so that you don’t disturb those lucky case that behind every silver lining – a boom
shoppers who have been privileged enough economy in Macau – is a cloud, or is it that
to be granted access and the opportunity to behind every cloud – the economic downturn
spend their money? – is a silver lining?
The obsessive-compulsive disorder and Does it take an economic downturn for us
the ‘must have’ mentality that seem to afflict to look again at our values, to revalue, to see
so many shoppers in Macau where brand- what’s really worthwhile in our lives?
april 2009
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