We get lost along the way and have to stop for directions. The middle-aged couple we ask are kind enough to point it out to us in the street directory and we are practically across the street from it. My father rolls his eyes, curses and thanks the couple, who chuckle and walk off. I wonder what they thought of us as the car lurches around the median strip in an ad-hoc U-turn.
The electronics store is stuffy and filled with clueless staff barely out of high-school. We are directed to different counters before we find My name is Martin, the man we ordered the TV with. The conversation drifts over the size of the boot compared with the TV box and what the best price we can get is. I busy myself by standing far too close to a giant plasma TV so that my eyes cross and my head hurts.
“We should have got this one.â€?
Mum shakes her head at the exorbitant price tag and tells me not to knock anything as if I’m a child. I bite my tongue before I snap back at her and cause a scene. There’s no point, I tell myself.