Shopping: the 40th sport at Asiad

Doha: The 15th Asian Games already has an incredible 39 sports in its programme, but a strong argument could be made to include at least one more - shopping.

Hundreds of athletes and officials have been rushing from shopping centre to shopping centre, buying those absolute necessities as well as items that are less important.

The Qatari capital offers several excellent opportunities to partake in the sport. Not only does Doha have a host of modern, glitzy shopping malls filled with brand-name shops, there are also the traditional souqs (markets) where one can buy just about everything from spices to fabrics and carpets to cameras.

Indian badminton coach Pullela Gopichand says most of the Indian delegates will be spending their money on souvenirs.

"We will not really do a lot of shopping. Just what is essential and probably some souvenirs to take back home.

"Basically everything, but mainly T-shirts with Asian Games written on them and other merchandise, something that has Doha and Qatar written on them so that you can remember the Asian Games when you are back home."

Pullela said that the Indian athletes received about $20 a day, which they could spend as they wished.

For many athletes from some of the less-developed Asian countries, coming to Qatar offers a shopping experience they would not necessarily have back home.

Standing beside a shopping trolley filled with, amongst other things a vacuum cleaner, a microwave oven, a meat grinder and a toaster-oven, Uzbekistan canoeing athlete Yulia Borzova explains that she and some of her teammates were looking for things that they could take home for the New Year.

"Things are not too expensive here. In Uzbekistan we would pay more. You can see what we bought: A microwave and a vacuum cleaner. But we also buy things like caps and T-shirts.

"Shops in Uzbekistan have most things, but not in such variety and they are also more expensive."

Borzova says she is not worried about getting the things back to Uzbekistan. "We have many people in the team, so we will just divide it up."

Bayazid Alam Nipu, who is a coach of the Bangladesh football team competing at the Asian Games, is also spending some of his free time in the shopping malls.

"Yes, we will be shopping. We will be buying some household appliances, some religious things and then some important things like a television. Last evening we purchased a video camera and a digital camera."

PAGE_BREAK

He says that although most branded items are available in Bangladesh, there were two reasons why athletes and officials would still buy in Qatar.

"It is like a hobby for people when they go abroad to purchase something as a souvenir.

"And then there is also the general belief that things made for Arab countries are somewhat of a better quality than things back home."

Ali Akbar, who runs an exclusive jewellery shop in the City Centre, says that business has been good since the Asian Games started.

"We have had a lot of guests coming in and there has been an increase in sales. They buy mostly watches. They buy watches that are in the normal price - ranging from 3,000 riyal (about $850) and above.

"This is a very exclusive shop - we have a price range from 3,000 riyal - to 300,000. I have sold at least five or six watches to athletes and am hoping to sell some more."

But it is not just curios that athletes and officials buy. A grocery store in the shopping centre has also done brisk business.

South Korean women's football coach Choi In Chul spent a morning buying groceries for some of the Korean officials.

"We have some extra officials who are not staying in the athletes' village, so we have to make our own food. In the athletes' village we get all meals, but not for those who do not stay there.

"There were some restrictions on the number of officials we could bring and as we brought more we have to make our own arrangements for them," he says.

But whether it is groceries, curios or household appliances that they are buying, athletes and officials seem to make the most of the opportunities they have and far more participate in shopping than in any of the official sports.

The major advantage of shopping as a sport is the fact that the playing fields are level and that competitors can compete against each other irrespective of gender or age - unless, of course, you happen to be from East Timor (per capita GDP is $400) and have to compete against a shopper from Hong Kong whose GDP per capita is $36,800.