Final Call: Last-Minute Shopping at the Airport

We’ve all been there. So damned busy with work and going-away parties and booking flights home and whatever else that you forget to buy all your Christmas presents. Well, if you’ve truly procrastinated your gift-shopping until the last minute, help is at hand.

Let’s assume you are heading home via the airport. No one gets a boat home – and even if they do, it’s a fact that no one has rushed to board a ship since Dickens stopped knocking books out. As for a train home? Forget it. If you are sat on the Trans-Siberian, you’ve enough time to handcraft everyone a gift. Without further ado, then, let’s survey the shops at PEK.

TERMINAL 2 – DEPARTURES
Caundilo
What do you get the man who has everything? How about the brand that appears to exist nowhere else? We’ve researched high and low and come up with nothing on this menswear retailer. Think of it as a higherend Cliocoddle. Perfect for dad or granddad.

Sunbird Internet Access
By all logic, a cybercafe can’t offer much as a shopping destination … and yet this one will sell you phone covers, model tanks and toy helicopters.

Generic Shop
Yes, it is actually called Generic Shop and the goods live up to the name. Who are all these people going to airports without any luggage?

Tea House
“In China, where I live now, there is no more prestigious gift than tea.” Are you willing to tell people that with a straight face? If so, stock up here.

SALE Shop
An airport outlet store seems like a great idea, but full-size furniture is quite impractical as carry-on baggage.

TERMINAL 2 – ARRIVALS
SKAP Women
If you somehow know women who are OK with you buying them footwear that would horrify the characters of Sex & the City, then boy are you in luck. Good for outdoorsy types.

TERMINAL 3 – DEPARTURES
CITIC Bookstore
Glossy Chinese magazines are an affordable novelty and an English-language version of the Guinness Book of Records 2013 will set you back RMB 370.

Convenience Shop
Orion Pies, underwear and Chinese tea at standard prices. “In China, where I live now, there is no more prestigious gift than an Orion Pie” … No, on second thought, stick to the tea.

Specialty Shop
The specialty here is Chinese memorabilia: cute Peking Opera figurines (RMB 118), plush pandas in Superman costume (RMB 299), and chopsticks and tea sets.

Tibetan Arts
Ideal for small gifts for female family and friends (or forward-thinking fellows). Odds and ends include earrings and scarves but their inventory also includes pocket-punishing artwork. We spotted one picture with a price tag of RMB 26,000.

A-Silk
If it’s made of silk, you’ll find it here. Qipaos, pashminas, shawls and housecoats galore.

Nitya Paris
Nitya is actually a Parisian label of some repute rather than a China-only impostor. The prices for their understated womenswear reflects this fact.

China Gold
Gold sold by the ounce at the market price is not the most heartwarming of stocking-fillers, but if you have the cash, why not opt for traditional Chinese figurines in white gold?

Yu Shi Yuan
Christmas has a long history with dried fruit, but China would probably argue that they invented it. Make everybody happy by shopping in this preserved fruit store.

Gift World
More plush pandas in more costume, RC cars, chopstick sets and a panda-hooded gilet.

Franz
This modern porcelain retailer has some truly beautiful pieces – at prices that are much less easy on the eye.

1436 Erdos
This Inner Mongolian brand specializes in cashmere. There are some classy pieces for both men and women to be found among the crass look-at-me-wear.

TERMINAL 3 – ARRIVALS
SKAP
A footwear brand you are very unlikely to see outside China. Most useful if you forgot to wear shoes to the airport.

JEEP
No military vehicles for sale here, but you can buy Jeep-branded jeans and rugged outerwear.

London Fog
The longstanding American coat producer got a boost from being featured in Mad Men and getting Christina “Joan Holloway” Hendricks to model for them. This outlet offers menswear and luggage.

Failing that …
If you fly at unsociable hours, you’re out of luck. Not even the Chinese job market can afford to staff airport shops round the clock. You’re in trouble unless you can think on your feet (e.g. cans of Yanjing from the vending machines so that the folks back home can enjoy the taste of Beijing’s brew?). If all else fails, we suggest being nice to those lovely flight attendants. They can be sweet-talked into parting with those first-class toiletry bags.

*TOP TIP
If you’re flying at a reasonable time (i.e. between 6.30am and 8pm), there’s good news. NLGX has concessions at T3’s Gate E29 and opposite the Starbucks in T2. Get in there for the kind of Made in Beijing T-shirts and laptop cases that you’d buy even if you weren’t shopping in an airport.

Photos: nlgx.org