a thousand words on why I don't care about this subject

I’ve noticed a change in myself recently, and I’m trying to figure out why. By "recently" I mean over the past ten years. And by "change" I mean fade away.

I'm talking about haggling. This is something that many of us who travel in poor countries engage in. Even though the real dollar amount is small, there's something bothersome about getting “the tourist price”. Everyone wants the local price, it’s a badge of honor, something you can tell your friends about when you get home.

Many of you have been on the receiving end of exactly these stories. The setting is a sophisticated dinner party in Manhattan or Washington DC. Someone remarks on the African (or Asian) piece of art (or sculpture) on the wall (or coffee table), and everyone stands around with their chablis admiring it. Eventually (inevitably), the story of its acquisition is told, and that story, quite frequently, involves a deep personal connection between buyer and seller, such that “he gave us the local price.”

There’s always a pause after that revelation, to give you a chance to be impressed. You didn’t know your host was such a friend of the downtrodden. You didn’t realize he had the ability to forge such deep personal connections with marketplace vendors --- and so quickly! after a ten minute chat! --- such that for the sake of friendship this vendor would forgo the need to earn profit and feed his eight children. Your host must be an incredible person, far more profound and spiritual than you’ve given him credit for. Funny, he seemed so ordinary on the outside.

I’m not judging. I mock because I care. I mock because I too was someone who needed to get the local price. I too have haggled over a five cent banana.

But I don’t anymore. And that’s my long-winded way of getting to the point: I don’t haggle anymore.

Okay, that’s not true. I haggle, but only in dollar terms. I will haggle over a ninety-dollar rug, if I think I can get it down to fifty. But I will not haggle over a fifty-cent cup of tea, even if my refusal to haggle costs me a thousand dong (official currency of Vietnam).

And why? Is it because I have more money now? I don't think so. As much as I like to romanticize my poverty-stricken college days --- and it's true I did hitchhike around Europe gnawing on day-old baguettes --- I don’t think there was ever a time when ten cents was a big deal to me.

Another possibility is that I'm getting older. I’m not as angry at the world. I no longer worry that everyone is trying to rip me off. Because I know everyone is trying to rip me off, and I have more important things to care about.

The third possibility is that it’s a confidence thing. I finally have nothing to prove. I only cared about getting tourist prices when I was worried I might actually be one.

This explanation makes sense. The more I think about it, what other weird behaviors accompanied my need to “get the local price”? Well, I was petrified of carrying a camera around my neck. I wanted photos, but struggled to take them because I hated having people see me with a camera in my hand. And never in a million years would I hang one in that neck position reserved for tourists.

I would never wear logos, or any clothing with too much of an American flavor. My reasoning at the time was that this would help me blend in. (Yes, that’s right, during a summer spent in the West African country of Mali, this white boy devoted serious mental energy to "the best way to blend in.")

Another eyebrow-raiser: I hated taking out maps in public. I would find a secluded corner, press my forehead into it, and then surreptitiously remove the map from my pocket and consult it in a tachycardic sweat, before shoving it back into my pocket and proceeding nonchalantly down the street.

My logic was that I was at greater risk of being mugged if I openly took out a map. I imagined the thieves in Kinshasa crouching in alleys, scanning fruitlessly for tourists, frustrated to tears.... and only when I slipped up and exposed my map did they cry A-ha!

Today, all the tourist-hating behaviors are gone. I take out maps and stare at them, and squint at the sky, and scratch my head. I wear stupid American clothing everywhere. (When we went gorilla tracking I wore my “I ♥ BX” T-shirt, and only realized it later when I saw the photos of myself.) And the only reason I don’t hang a camera around my neck is that I can’t keep one unbroken long enough to do so.

I guess for me haggling is like a fluffernutter: I remember the old appeal, and I can still enjoy it, but somewhere along the way it just stopped being a part of my life.