Food court blues

I'm typing away in an internet cafe/arcade in West Edmonton Mall, 'the greatest indoors show on Earth' as the brochure says (the Calgary Stampede is apparantly the 'greatest outdoors show on earth' so it seems the Albertans have quite the monopoly on 'greatness', or so they like to believe). It sure is a monstrosity. This is straight from Wikipedia:

...covers a gross area of 500,000 m² (5.4 million ft²) and cost 1.2 billion to build. There are over 800 stores and services and parking for more than 20,000 vehicles in the world's largest parking lot. More than 23,000 people are employed at the property. The mall receives 22 million visits per year.

The mall has North America's largest indoors waterpark (indoor beach) with a wave pool, as well as an ice rink, indoor lake with performing sea lions and a mini golf course. It's not surprising big business decided to plonk the mall here in one of the coldest cities in the world. What else is there for people to do during those looooong winter months but consume baby,consume!

I have vague recollections of coming here 20 yrs ago as a little fella. I remember they were just adding the indoor beach.

I've stuck to my word and not bought a single thing here, besides the tokens to operate this machine i.e my lifeline. I'm going home.

MG