With improvisation in standards of living, man has developed a tendency to follow the modern culture blindly. Like every other thing, we tend to look at malls and fully air conditioned shops for buying the tiniest of things. Don’t we? Earlier we used to suffice with products bought from roadside shops. But nowadays hawkers, street vendors and roadside shops have turned out to be a menace for common people. The greed for maximum comfort has lead us to push ourselves towards luxury.
Purchasing from fancy shops have become a status symbol of us. The craze for affiliation from high society people are driving us towards the act of pretentiousness. Even for buying a small item, we rush to the nearby mall. The result is that, we end up buying more things which we find interesting in the displays outside numerous shops. This invites unnecessary expenses as well as wastage of goods. On our trail to outdo people around us, we have to bear a lot of sacrifices, such as:
1. Extra expense. As mentioned earlier, while walking around the stores, we can get carried away and might end up buying more things than required. This increases our expenses and we spend those money which could have been used in a much productive way.
2. Wastage of resources and raw material. When we buy thing out of ‘want’, after sometime it loses its importance and turns out to be a waste. Its only the things bought out of ‘need’ that stays for long. So there is a huge loss incurred in place of judicial usage of resources.
3. Fuel consumption. Driving to the mall for small purchases are very harmful for the nature. The fuel is burnt, which promotes the traces of carbon footprints in the atmosphere.
4. High prices as compared to local shops. Another pitfall of shopping at malls is the high prices of the products as compared to the goods that are available locally, which can be easily avoided if we shop locally.
There are many such reasons to avoid malls and fancy shops. Instead we can use roadside shops, which are at walking distances. This will reduce the intensity of pollution and destruction done to the nature while ensuring that our life becomes more healthier and happier.
Let’s take an oath in this lent season to avoid sophisticated malls and accept small, yet reliable local shops.
