I very seldom visit a Shopping Mall, unless I have something specific to buy there. Shopping Mall life has become part of the modern "village" offering a space for people to be themselves and express themselves.
I had to pick up a pair of shoes and I went to Dolphin Mall in Miami, my first ever visit there, despite my long association with Miami.
My anthropological observations:
The energy of the atmosphere was electric . One is confronted with an array of eateries, most of whom are responsible for the Obesity prevalence which has not yet hit the Generation Z immigrants from places as far as Lebanon and as close as Venezuela.
What sets this mall apart is that it might have been built for the wealthy of the south American continent, as there is a large Money Exchange counter, something you normally do not see in an USA mall ?
Most of the shoppers were very nattily dressed young women, from the south with various accents to their Spanish, usually being chaperoned or chaperoning an elderly relative, a mother or aunt. To look at this wave of shoppers who would be seated in their business class seats on Avianca or Latam in a few days time was the highlight of my visit
In Morocco or in Buenos Aires, when you enter a cafe, you might be greeted by a venerated veteran of the trade. Servicing the table does not rank high in social status in the USA and it is almost always done by transient young people on their way to somewhere else, like a Law School?
This is a temple to the God of Consumerism (you tend to believe in things you do not know) and the entire world is serving each other, young Colombian women serving well off compatriots who have not migrated but flourishing in the country.
I reached the shoe store where I had to pick up a package and on entering, a Chinese man, neither warm nor cold, when told I was there to pick a package, went straight to the back and brought my package, I had not told him my name .. here is the racial profiling a sign of intelligence? I have a distinct asian name and the intelligent chinese migrant put two and two together and got the package, in miami, the most common surnames are Gonzalez, Fernandez, Izquierdo etc..
The food court where did they imagine such a name, it was a hungry court in that what was offered as food did not blend well with the well dressed ladies from the austral parts of this continent, who were lining up to the greasy "chinese" restaurant..Everything was generic, basically tasteless food, and with a flavour added .. Japanese Chinese New Orleans and the ever present Cuban outlet which did not look appetizing at all. The place was busy and I am glad that the well coiffed ladies would soon go home escaping this ill effect of capitalism.
I chatted with the people who were manning booths in the walkways inside the mall: selling tchotchkes, like we say or trying to force upon you, the dead sea salt remedies or the electrical massage. The salesmen were all migrants, none of them touching 30 years of age and from the Levant to the Andean altiplanos. I enjoyed looking at them.
The rain clouds were gathering outside. It is interesting that there was not much of a presence of Africa in this mall. Latins are not known for their love of Africa or Africans..
This is Miami 2022, so different I am told from the village of Miami that existed here in the 1960s when migration from Cuba changed the face of this tropical laid back town.
Now it is an energetic, latin influenced (social, fraternal and corrupt among others) town where you are never too far away from the sea ...
Miami does have beautiful blue skies and wonderful clouds ..
