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The shop window looked tempting. All the merchandise displayed in it seemed to call "Come and get me!" Without any hesitation I pushed the door.
"May I help you?" a young woman approached me with a broad smile on her face. She was pretty. Eying her up and down I raised my left eyebrow as I thought - sure you may help me but I am not sure whether you would be pleased if I tell you what I had in mind.
"No, thank you," I said, "I' m just looking."
"Take your time," she said and walked away.
The situation surprised me because I wasn't used to such a treatment. Before coming to America I visited a lot of stores in my country but nobody who worked at them never asked me whether I needed help. The shop assistants were always busy talking to each other or watching flies on the ceiling - nobody was paying any attention to a stray customer-to-be. Telling the truth it didn't bother me because I knew what I was looking for and if I was lucky enough to find what I needed on the shelf or on the rack (at that time our stores were almost empty) I didn't need any help.
Here, in America, although the stores are full of goods which quantity, variety, colors and prices make me dizzy, I also know what I am at the store for; either I just want to look around or I want to buy something. And I don't need any help in either case but the constant question May I help you? is hanging over my head like a blade of guillotine.
At the beginning as I was learning English (I still am) I didn't know what kind of answer I should give to that invitation to collaboration so I mumbled something under my nose and bolted for the street.
The most embarrassing thing that happen to me was when I had to buy a new pair of shoes. There was no surprise to me when the lady at the shoe store greeted me with "May I help you?" I already knew what my answer should be because I had heard people at other stores answering the same question - "No, thank you. I'm just looking." But I also knew that under her polite question there was a trap; she wanted to sell me what I didn't want or I couldn't afford to buy.
What I needed was just a regular, comfortable an inexpensive pair of shoes. Looking at the shelf against the wall I found what I liked but unfortunately there was only one shoe of the kind that I was going to purchase. And that was the time to ask for help. While the lady disappeared in the back of he store in search for the missing shoe I sat down on one of the chairs in the middle of the room. What happened next surpassed all my expectation. The lady returned with a carton box in her hand, went down on her knees just in front of me and than leaned forward over my feet. A quick glimpse at the mirror on the wall behind the lady's back assured me that I wasn't a saint; there was no halo above my head. What are you doing, my child? I wanted to ask her. Bending forward and touching her elbow I tried to help her to get up but she moved back and looking up asked:
"Wouldn't you like to try these shoes?"
"Well, certainly I would," I said and raised up my leg in order to take off the old shoe but she was faster grabbing it before my hands reached the shoe-lace. "You don't need to do this. I'll do it myself," I whispered and at the same time I was looking around to see whether the other customers noticed what was going on.
There was a time in my life when somebody else used to put shoes on my feet. But back then I was a little fellow and inexperienced in that matter, so it was all right. As a middle aged man now I don't need this kind of help. It embarrasses me. It shows that instead of growing up I am still a little one.
"I'll do it myself," I emphasized my request what made her, I think, angry because she got up, beat dust off her knees and disappeared in the back of the store again.
The shoes were good. They were regular, comfortable and inexpensive. That's just what I was looking for. I paid for them at the cashier's desk and left the store with a sigh of relief.
Another day I entered a huge store. From the outside it looked like a hangar but inside instead of air crafts, I found the whole space filled with an enormous amount of, in various shapes and sizes, racks. It was again that I experienced a dizziness caused by too much to look at. There was no plan in my mind to buy anything, I just wanted to see what that store had to offer. But a little man in a gray suit who appeared in front of me out of nowhere didn't know that.
"May I help you, sir?" he asked looking up at me. He was at least one foot smaller than me and probably that's why I hadn't noticed him among the racks before.
"No, thank you. I'm just looking," I said.
"Take your time," he said and disappeared in the jungle of metal and fabric. Taking his advice to my heart I was strolling once to the left and then to the right and again to the left and to the right. At one moment I stopped to look closer at a jacket.
"May I help you?" the gray suit was by my side again.
"No, no. I'm just looking," I smiled to him.
"If you need any help just let me know," a servile smile appeared on his face.
"I'll let you know," I assured him. What do you want from me? I wanted to ask him while he was walking away. If I need help I will ask for it. Don't bother me! Leave me alone! Or maybe you think that I am a shop-lifter? But it was obvious that he liked me. Although a few other just looking customers appeared at his department, he dogged me. I moved to one rack - he immediately moved to the next to mine. I touched a hanger with pants on it - he tried to smooth out something on another hanger. From time to time our eyes met and it seemed that I saw in them his question May I help you? but I already had enough of his importunate company.
Without looking back I moved to another department of the store.
This time nobody bothered me.
What a nice surprise! I was alone strolling and just looking at... the women's lingerie.
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