@Magnifico said: "I find it hard to believe that Carrefour and Wal-Mart would risk damage to their reputation by allowing fake products."

What Walmart and Carrefour allow is a certain level of autonomy to their branches, which some take advantage of:

sale of fake Louis Vuitton bags, fake moutai, fake donkey meat, fake organic pork, fake discounted prices, and even more...

Talking about bags, yankee. Not a single bag Ive ever bought has lasted more than a month (thats, at most).

So I bought a new again, this time from the streets of Jakarta. Some slum area too and sold on a bridge. Didnt expect too much, and it was cheap too.

Now guess what. That bag has lasted for two months now, and is still going strong. Somebody should start importing cheap bags from the slums of Jakarta!

@mmkunmingteacher

So that Absolut Vodka the clubs serve up is real then?

Better stick to our vodka (Tovaritch).
Real Russian import and tasty (especially the red wild-berries vodka). You can get it at Moondog for example.

Did anyone mention the Burmese Gin mixed in a "Gin & Tonic"?

If you ever fly through HK, the airport duty free is a good place to pick up a bottle of Johnny Blue.

I have never seen a "Duty Free" shop at any airport which was cheaper than a regular store in the city itself- ever! Maybe no duty but the prices are super-inflated because of the rent they pay.
Only exception of something cheaper I have seen: PlayStations and X-Boxes in Dubai and Abu Dhabi are cheaper than in stores in Western countries. Just stay in town for a day or 2 before flying on and when you're out of the airport you can buy a Smokey Johnny probably cheaper.

+ you can drink it and not sit with that bottle in your lap for another long flight.

da vinci is right....man does that sound funny to a agree with a "Da Vinci" thinking of Leonardo.lol
abu dhabi is crazy cheap.
i bought a jim beam black triple aged, as mellow as a kiss from god, for 200+RMB plus they pretty much accept every major currency or a combo of it.

about booze in clubs. I have been told by a club owner in BJ that most booze is fake. That has to do with the distributors trying to skim a bit extra. that is the guy who told me about the formaldehyde eye /fumes test. he said that up to 2/3 of the deliveries are fakes. he had two people working just to.test the booze.

interesting fact drinking in his joint rarely got you hungover unless you really binge drank. but even then, hangovers were far less severe.

the problem aren't the shops 'per se' but the distributors.

Yeah duty free prices aren't great, but in HK airport at least, you get real stuff and pay in HKD, a lot better than fake and paying RMB.

As Dudeson points out, one good thing about fake booze is that you can pound the stuff and get less messed up. Just wished we paid fake prices too lol.