Death by Ukay-ukay

About two weeks ago, my mom texted me a warning about stopping my patronage of ukay-ukays (the Philippines' version of a thrift store/vintage shop, whatever you want to call it). She told me she was able to catch an episode of CSI: New York wherein brides drop dead on the floor on the day of their respective nuptials due to their wedding gowns. A local mortician makes money out of selling to thrift stores the clothes worn by corpses that arrive in his/her facility (I haven't seen this episode yet so I'm not sure about the sex of the mortician). This is after he's just finished embalming the bodies in formalene and all the other chemicals they use.

It was kind of creepy because I was scheduled to meet up with the girls at our fave ukay-ukay by Friday (my mom texted me Monday afternoon). Was that mother's intuition or what? Anyhoo, I had a quick retort to my mom. Discovery Channel's featured the same story in their wonderfully entertaining series on urban legends entitled 'Fact or Fiction.' They interviewed a pathologist to confirm or debunk the veracity of that particular myth.

My mom told me that in CSI: New York's storyline, the wedding gowns' lining got completely soaked in the embalming liquids and that as a result, some of them got trapped in the clothing article until they got absorbed by the victims through the pores on the skin. Completely untrue, said the pathologist. Case closed.

If you're like me who shops at ukay-ukay's, the number one rule should be that you'd have to wash first the items you've purchased before using it - for sanitary reasons. Although the clothes may look great, you can never tell what condition the original owner of that clothing article has.