...let me count the ways...
I've only been to Costco once before. It was in Richmond, VA, and it wasn't exactly a life shattering event. It's pretty much like Sam's. Only northern-er. Ok, I know, Richmond was the capital of the Confederacy and all that, but that was a long time ago. I think the carpet baggers won them over or something. I mean, I really like the city and everything, but it's pretty much the North now. And besides, that wasn't my point...
A couple of weekends ago (ok, when I started this post it was a couple of weeks ago...just pretend like I posted this two weeks ago...), we took a day trip to Busan. Busan is the largest port city in South Korea and the fifth largest port city in the world and has a population of about 4 million people. It's supposed to have beautiful beaches, and it's the home of the largest department store in the world, Shinsegae Centum City (no, seriously, it's in the Guinness Book of World Records - you can look it up). Oh, yeah, and I think maybe I heard there might be a Costco or something like that.
Ok, ok, you got me. Yes, we drove (ok, rode, really) 3 hours EACH WAY just to go to Costco. But we went to Shinsegae Centum City while we were there. I mean, we weren't going to spend the
whole day in Costco.
All three expat families went. Our drivers (Did I mention we have drivers? We don't have Korean drivers licenses yet, but we're working on it) picked us up at 8:00 am. We all met up and tried to keep together on the drive, which, with the traffic, wasn't as difficult as you'd think. The traffic was awful! I mean, awful. It was like rush hour in Baton Rouge on Friday afternoon when someone got in a wreck that's blocking a lane on the interstate. Except that the drivers are worse than Baton Rouge drivers (didn't know that was possible), and you never got to a point where you saw why the traffic was so bad. Never saw a wreck, never saw a closed lane. You're driving really slowly, crawling really, in bumper-to-bumper traffic, and then out of nowhere, you're going the speed limit again. I hate that!
Anyway, despite all of my strong-willed desires never to go to a Korean rest stop again, and against my better judgment, we did. And lucky for you, I had the presence of mind to take pictures this time. Aren't you so excited? Ok, you're not, but you didn't have to be so emphatic about it.
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| Outside food vendor |
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| Random things on sticks (don't get the "corn dog" - seriously, trust me on this, just don't.) |
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| Order counter for "food court" |
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| Plastic models for menu items |
In the picture above is the water dispenser. The cabinet on the right is the cup sanitizer. You use the water dispenser on the left to fill your metal cup from a shelf in the cabinet, and then, when you've finished, you place the cup in hole of the sanitizer. That's right - no water, no soap. A sanitizer. Like my Sonicare toothbrush. Which I still rinse with water. Oh, and the water dispenser... do you see the pink and blue spigots? Yeah, the blue one is cool water, and the pink one is hot water. And I mean
steaming hot water. Seriously - you can make instant coffee with this stuff. Except they usually don't. They usually just drink it straight. Hot water. And, Preeti, I always thought you were crazy!
In these pictures is the convenience store at the rest stop, much like the one in which I had my first (and so far only) breakdown the first night we arrived in Korea. The food doesn't look quite as unfamiliar as it did that night. Not much more appetizing, mind you, but a little more familiar at least. Check out the chips below. Yeah, it says prawn chips, i.e., shrimp-flavored chips. Don't ask me what they taste like. I'm not trying that crap! The Korean "Bugles" are pretty good, though.
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This is Blake with our driver, Mr. Cheung. His
English isn't that great, but it's infintely better
than our Korean, and he's a very nice guy. |
Anyway, so eventually we all had our potty breaks and managed to find at least semi-edible snacks, and we continued the trek to Busan. When we arrived, I finally grasped just how large the city was. I don't know what I was expecting, but this place seemed huge. I didn't actually know the population until I looked up a little information about Busan to write this post. And it made me grateful that we live in Yeosu and not the sprawling metropolis of Busan.
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These are all high-rise apartment
buildings (similar to ours but higher)
which are where most people in
South Korea live. |
When we finally got close to the department store, our driver pointed it out. And it really is huge. I told you so. See, they even have a banner, so it must be true!
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See the English written on the building? I
will never again complain about things being
written in Spanish in the US again. |
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Banner, which obviously
proves its legitimacy |
So we actually went to this store because we knew that we could find Western food here. And at this point, we were all craving some Western food. The selection in Yeosu is fairly limited. I mean, I love McDonald's chicken McNuggets as much as the next guy, but you can only eat them so many times a month, you know? We were told specifically that this store contained a Macaroni Grill, which sounded great. But when we finally reached the restaurant, this is what we found...
Not exactly what we were expecting, apparently the restaurant bears resemblance to the American chain of Italian restuarants in name only. But not to worry - we quickly made our way to the food court, where we found several Western, fast food choices. And I have to say, even though I don't particularly frequent Burger King in the States, that was the best burger I had eaten in quite a while. One of the things I have learned is that everything's relative over here, and you can pout or be happy with what you can find. Mom and Dad, do you remember the joke on our Montana mission trip years ago about "being flexible"? Yeah, we had no idea... Then again, after hearing about your recent trip to Haiti, I don't think
we have any idea over here!
Anyway, so after eating a tasty lunch, we proceeded to paruse the "department store," which is really more of a mall. It has separate shops for the different brands and stores, so I'm not sure really what qualifies it to be anything other than a shopping mall. We saw many brands we recognized - Gap, Banana Republic (no Old Navy, though...
sigh), Chanel, Louis Vuitton, etc. - and plenty that we didn't. We enjoyed window shopping for a while and then eventually wandered into a book store that had books in English! We bought a Korean-English dictionary and a Korean phrase book, only one of which we've really used since then, and our purchase proffered us a free gift from the customer service counter. You can't beat free souveneirs.
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| From the atrium below |
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| The escalators |
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| The ice rink |
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Our free souvenier - a canvas Hangul
(Korean writing) tiger bag |
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| The tiger is made up of tiny Korean characters |
And much to our delight, much of Centum City was decked out in wonderful, Western-commercialization Christmas splendor. And normally, it annoys me when stores put out their Christmas displays before it's even Thanksgiving, but this time I didn't mind. You know, the whole beggars can't be choosers thing. Seems to be a recurring theme here.
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| The Yeosu Albemarle Wives Club |
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| Christmas with Cinderella display in the atrium |
As we were about to leave the mall, we noticed a hallway near Starbucks, from an employee-only area of the mall. And in keeping with the Korean culture of good service, they have the following instruction on the floor to remind the employees as they step back into the public area of the mall, crowded with money-carrying customers. The guys stood there until we saw a couple employees come out - and yes, they actually turn on the smiles at the line, even bowing before they step over.
So we finally decided it was time to head to Costco. And it was everything we hoped it would be! Only, a little Korean-er.
But don't let the octopus fool you. There was plenty of American stuff, too. We stocked up on all the perishables that we couldn't ship over and can't find in Yeosu. We found shredded mozzarella, shredded mild cheddar, blocks of sharp cheddar and colby jack, string cheese, Babybel, slices of pepper jack (Blake's favorite), cream cheese, and sour cream. You don't realize how crucial cheese is to your diet until all you can find are rediculously over-priced slices of sandwhich cheese. We loaded our carts (yes, I said cartS - we had 2) with boneless, skinless chicken breasts, ground beef, roast, and andouille sausage - all things we either can't get where we live or cost significantly less than they do here. We found cherry Coca-Cola and, yes, even Dr. Pepper. We even found some badminton rackets so that we can try out the courts at our apartment complex. And so far, we've used those even less than the Korea phrases book we got at Centum City. Oh well, it will get warm again someday. And until then, we have enough cheese to last us... well, a while, at least.
But when we got to the checkout line, we realized we had a problem. A big problem. You see, Costco only takes cash, so we had brought some. But as we did a quick tally of the items in our cart, we estimated that we weren't going to have enough. So I stood in line with the carts, while Blake went to the ATM, just past the checkout area. I got to the front of the checkout line, and the girl started running all my items across the scanner. I kept shooting furtive glances at Blake, who had been at the ATM for what seemed like an eternity to me. And as the people behind me got more annoyed, Blake kept moving from machine to machine. And I kept getting more and more worried. I looked at my carefully gathered piles of meat and cheese and couldn't bear the thought of leaving them in Busan. Blake tried fruitlessly to reach the other families, to beg to borrow some cash, but if their experiences were anything like ours, they wouldn't have had any left anyway. Finally (it's ok, you can exhale now, I know you've been holding your breath), after the cashier had found a way to pause our purchase and had begun checking out other customers, Blake finally found an ATM machine/correct card combination that gave us some cash. And we were able to bring all of our glorious booty home!
