Braving the mall melee

Ray Naylor, with his hands between his knees, sat on a bench in the middle of a winter wonderland. Holiday music played through the air. Trees decorated with bows, snow and tinsel stood around him. Children scampered past him to another bench where Santa sat.

Naylor was at the mall.

"I look forward to this as much as a tooth removal," the 62-year-old elementary school principal said, referring to the obligatory holiday shopping trip. "I have been here for one-and-a-half hours and am still not done."

Naylor was wrong. He was done with his own shopping. He had bought both of the school's secretaries scarves, the school's seven aides scarves and the two school nurses scarves.

But, despite his shopping victories, Naylor did not budge from the white plastic bench and join the rest of the busy shoppers. His wife was not ready to go.

"She is still in there," he said, nodding to Lord & Taylor. "She's finding all her Christmas gifts, which she will then tell me to buy."

Most University students, however, have not even had the chance to go to the mall or even to start thinking about holiday shopping.

"I'll be lucky if I make it to the stores to get a dress for Winter Formals," Amanda Gumberg '02 said. "This school just doesn't give you the time to go shopping, so that leaves me just Winter Break to get gifts for my friends."

Marissa Cunningham '02 has similar plans. "I am going to New York during Winter Break and getting all of my presents in a couple of hours. I just can't do it now — I have no time, no car and shopping online is just a pain. So I won't be shopping when school is still in session."

Naylor seemed to be the only exhausted shopper last night at Quakerbridge Mall off U.S. Route 1.

Shoppers of all ages — from small children who came to tell Santa exactly what they wanted to their dedicated parents — scrambled across the mall's white linoleum floors like ants.

"We are trying to find gifts for our friends and a couple of things for ourselves," said Jennifer Fennimore, 17, who was looking at a fuzzy backless shirt and a pair of glittery jeans with a friend. "We aren't really glitter people, so we haven't found anything yet. But we will be shopping until Christmas."

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Fennimore was visiting the meccas for teeny-bopper girls and their gift-driven mothers. These stores, such as Delia's and Wet Seal, have put only a few, select items on sale for the holiday season, like pajamas and "princess T-shirts."

The rest of the stores' attractions — such as glittery tops, pleather pants and jeans of various cuts — run from $29.99 to $49.99.

"We have been pulling in around $40,000 of business a week since the holiday season started," said Wet Seal manager Candace Richardson. "I have two assistants under me, and then 12 girls working for me. We are going to pull in more business once the hours get longer."

Quakerbridge is open from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. this week. The hours will get only longer as the holiday season continues.

"We keep getting new imports and they are all just flying off the racks," Richardson said.

On the other side of the mall, senior sales associate Dan Cenker did not have as much help as Richardson. Cenker, in a sweat-soaked Oxford shirt, ran around the small, yet crowded, Gamestop — the mall's center for "interactive media."

"This week, everything has all gone pop. Our rival, Electronic's Fatigue, had a fire last week, so we have gotten all of their business," said Cenker, who was selling one customer the games Sabrina, Power Puff Girls, and Mia Hamm for Nintendo. "The girl games have really come out this season. Many players, including myself, say it's about time."

Cenker is less calm about his other merchandise. "Don't even ask for Play Station 2. It's gone. You're not going to get it. It flew off the shelves in the first few hours," he said. And off he rushed to another customer.

And within the mall maelstrom, Ray Naylor remained on his bench, bags in hand and parka zipped. "I would just like to go home now. My wife will take care of the rest," he said.