Home plus!

As a follow up to my last post, I tried a new church on Sunday afternoon and, so far, really liked it.  The church is called New Philadelphia, and it is an English church plant of a Korean church.  It was only planted a couple months ago, so everything is still on the ground level.  The people were so welcoming, and it seems like a good place to possibly get plugged in.  It is, however, kinda far from where I live, so I haven't decided whether I'll keep looking for something closer or not.  Now on to what I really wanted to talk about, Home plus.

I've gotten pretty lucky in my location in Seoul; I'm in Yeonhui-dong, which is small neighborhood in the northwest-ish area of Seoul for those of you who really care.  I'm 5 minutes from my school, 5 minutes from a bus stop that can take me on about a 5 minute ride to the subway, and 5 minutes from a basic grocery store.  However, when I say "basic" grocery store, I mean basic...as in smaller than the 4 aisles of Marshall's IGA, or so it seems to me.  Upon arriving, I've been able to buy most of what I've been looking for at this store, Saruga. (sidenote- Fruits, vegetable and meat prices are through the roof here.  I don't know how people shop regularly.  I think it's almost cheaper to eat out every meal.  Be counting your blessings for affordable groceries, those of you in the States).  Unfortunately, there are just some simple, American food staples, like peanut butter and butter, that Saruga doesn't really offer.  It has been my task for the last couple days to find a large grocery, like E mart, Lotte, or Costco, to pick up these things.  I know these stores are out there in Seoul somewhere.  But for some reason, unknown to myself, it is almost impossible to find their location on the internet.  I would normally just bug one of the teachers I work with into telling me where he/she normally goes and what is closest.  But most of them are out of the country, and I actually haven't seen any of them since Friday so that option is out.  I am generally pretty good at finding what I want on the internet, but I just couldn't find the grocery store locations.

By the grace of God, today I found a site that somewhat vaguely and briefly laid out a handful of these hidden, secret locations.  I begin checking my vicinity to the stores and of course most of them were all the way across the city.  Finally I fell upon a site that indicated there was a Home plus, similar to Wal-mart, right outside the World Cup Stadium Park, which happens to be only a bus ride, a subway transfer and 3 stops away...that's pretty close.  So I went out to find it, and I did.  I can't even begin to describe the experience upon entering this store to someone who hasn't seen it firsthand, but I'll try my best. 

Imagine all the free samples of a Sam's Club combined with the home section and grocery section of a Wal-mart combined with the make-up counter of a department store on steroids combined with a man on a loud speaker literally screaming out meat specials or something and then add so many people that you can't walk 3 steps without bumping into someone.  Basically, it was AWESOME!!!  So lively and fun and exciting and a little stressful.  I took my time walking about and trying to decipher what the random Korean labels read, as most products were in Korean only.  After I had sufficiently found what I had come for, as well as after being talked into buying some moisturizing shampoo instead of a volumizing shampoo by a sales lady because the moisturizing was 2 for 1 (a choice which will probably haunt my hair until all that shampoo runs out), I found the check out line, attempted some broken Korean and made my way back home via the subway.  Of course, upon walking back into my apartment, I realized that I had actually still forgotten to get butter, 1 of like 3 things that I initially went for but oh well.  I'm supposed to be meeting with a teacher or 2 later this week for lunch, and I totally intend to ask them where the closest E mart and Lotte are, as I've heard those are even more of an adventure, as well as higher quality product. Overall, it was a pretty fun experience and largely a good day.

I know most of you are just getting up and getting ready for work, but holy cow it's 9:30pm here; I completely lost track of time.  All my exploring has tuckered me out.

Have an amazing week!!!

KendallCooke