[notShabu]

An insight that allowed me to get past mental blockers to bargaining (guilt, awkwardness, etc...) was the thought "I am a person, just like you, not some animal to be milked"

This allows the price to be sought in a non-adversarial way since it makes building a connection and understanding of the local situation a part of the communication.

Much of the awkwardness comes from not really understanding how the local market and local way of life works while also basically being royalty from an economic perspective. This out-of-touchness creates a principal agent problem where the "foreign" other is distrusted but also relied on for "truth".

The negative experience doesn't come from the literal economic damage of being scammed but being treated (or programmed) like a pig let to slaughter.