Birmingham & Its Jewellery Quarter

The grumpys all took a trip on the train to Brum one Saturday. Now, Birmingham gets a bit of a bad press hereabouts, but as a big city it has a lot going for it - a good pedestrianised city centre, lots of shops, and a very central railway station. Mrs Grumpy was desirious of seeing the canalside and the jewellery quarter. Lunch at 'The Handmade Burger Company' set-up by the canal, almost opposite the NIA was taken - not too expensive, but left us with a bit of a 'upmarket McD' feeling - and yikes! it was noisy - they do need to find the volume control on that sound system.
So, after lunch, we set off to follow the signs to the 'Jewellery Quarter' - and follow them we did, and follwo them, and follow them..... for a very long time. Following these retched signs took us through some less desirable bits of Birmingham city centre, introducing us to the down-and-out community and Brum's litter problem!
When we got, what we took to be the 'jewellery quarter' - it was closed, or at least as much of it as we could find. No! I lie to you! there was a small parade of shops selling seriously expensive baubles, each with a hustler outside. No sooner could we say ' only looking' were we bundled inside to look at the wares - I tell you these people had been taking lessons from the good souls in the Marrakech souks - and now the Marrakshis can learn from the brummies!
I had to use some magnificent subterfuge to get out with my cards still intact.
Now while this was alternately amusing and annoying, it left a seriously bad taste in my mouth - it was not at all the English way of doing things, and sets a very bad impression in the mind of the tourist.
Birmingham - get your house in order!