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One of the peculiarities of the Eastern bazaar is that shopkeepers dealing in the same kind of goods do not scatter themselves over the bazaar, in order to avoid competition, but collect in the same area, so that purchasers can know where to find them, and so that they can form a closely knit guild against injustice or persecution.In the cloth-market, for instance, all the sellers of material for clothes, curtains, chair covers and so on line the roadway on both sides, each open-fronted shop having a trestle trestle table for display and shelves for storage. Bargaining is the order of the cay, and veiled women move at a leisurely pace from shop to shop, selecting, pricing and doing a little preliminary bargaining before they narrow down their choice and begin the really serious business of beating the price down.
中東集市的特點之一是經銷同類商品的店家，為避免相互間的競爭，不是分散在集市各處，而是都集中在一塊兒，這樣既便于讓買主知道上哪兒找他們，同時他們自己也可以緊密地聯合起來，結成同盟，以便保護自己不受欺侮和刁難。例如，在布市上，所有那 1些賣衣料、窗簾布、椅套布等的商販都把貨攤一個接一個地排設在馬路兩邊，每一個店鋪門面前都擺有一張陳列商品的擱板桌和一些存放貨物的貨架。討價還價是人們習以為常的事。頭戴面紗的婦女們邁著悠閑的步子從一個店鋪逛到另一個店鋪，一邊挑選一邊問價;在她們縮小選擇范圍并開始正兒八經殺價之前，往往總要先同店主談論幾句，探探價底。
It is a point of honour with the customer not to let the shopkeeper guess what it is she really likes and wants until the last moment. If he does guess correctly, he will price the item high, and yield little in the bargaining.The seller, on the other hand, makes a point of protesting that the price he is charging is depriving him of all profit, and that he is sacrificing this because of his personal regard for the customer.Bargaining can go on the whole day, or even several days, with the customer coming and going at intervals.
對于顧客來說，至關重要的一點是，不到最后一刻是不能讓店主猜到她心里究竟中意哪樣東西、想買哪樣東西的。假如讓店主猜中了她所要買的商品的話，他便會漫天要價，而且在還價過程中也很難作出讓步。而在賣主那一方來說，他必須竭盡全力地聲稱，他開出的價錢使他根本無利可圖，而他之所以愿意這樣做完全是出于他本人對顧客的敬重。顧客有時來了又去，去了又來，因此，像這樣討價還價的情形有可能持續一整天，甚至好幾天。
