Everyone knows the old price

Today the sale is everywhere in Dubai, and almost nobody involved believes in it.

The shopper suspects the crossed-out price was never really charged. The seller knows it was raised a few weeks ago so it could be cut today. The person who made the banner knows the countdown will be back next month under a different name. Each of them holds a private doubt, and each of them goes along anyway.

That is what makes this different from an ordinary con. In the old version one person lies and another is fooled. Here nobody needs to be fooled. They only need to believe that everyone else will keep playing.

The shopper buys the second pair of trainers because the moment feels scarce, because a friend bought two, and because it would feel foolish to be the only one who did not. The seller discounts because the shop next door is discounting, and a shop that holds its price this week looks like a shop that missed the point. Each is counting on the next person to keep the story alive, so that the bill lands somewhere else.

Take away the crowd and it collapses at once. Nobody would invent this day alone. It needs a whole city agreeing, for a weekend, to treat a habit as an occasion.

The trouble with a shared belief is that it ends for everyone at the same moment. The trainers sit in the cupboard with the tags on. The margin that was given away does not come back in December. The customer who learned to wait for the next countdown does not unlearn it.

When the agreement wears off, there is nobody further down the line to hand it to. Everyone is holding the same box.