Bulk in Korea

Since I had heard about Costco since I had first researched coming to Korea, I thought it fitting to visit today of all days. The fridge was empty and I was running on precious little sleep. What better day for free samples?

Last night we went back to Uncle Don's, a darling little place above a kissing club (alleged brothel) between our house and Bumgae. After a disappointing first departure, and after some not-necessarily too alluring convincing (in actuality, I think what was said was, "Alexis, you should come back"), I was back in the bar instead of home, where is perhaps where I should have been. The bar owner wanted to shut down early, so she took us to another bar: a sort of norebong but with live instruments. After nursing a beer for an hour, I finally got up to sing (and, as it turns out, dance). I think I'm still a pretty terrible singer, but you really can't hear yourself up there, so no harm, no foul, right? To make a painfully tone-deaf story short, I rolled in this morning around four-thirty...at least I beat the sunrise. I didn't have to work today, so I just attempted to sleep for a bit before actually starting my Friday. Now I understand the plight of the nightshifter: sleeping while the world wakes is very tough.

I had heard from my new neighbour, who unfortunately is named Tom, that Costco was a whopping hour subway ride from home. Yikes. However, an hour really does pass quickly on these subways and in actuality, the ride from door to door took about that long. Sometimes back home we drive that far to go places. Right? God, sometimes its hard not to have a car.

So Costco is Costco, as far as I'm concerned. What you would see at home (except, sadly, the vast collection of English books...boooo), we saw here. Tuna, strangely, is wildly expensive here, but I bought it anyway, convinced that it was better than tuna we get at home. Suuure. I also braved the heat and the hour-long ride home and got a vat of cream cheese. I miss cheese. Koreans do NOT heart cheese. I'm Italian at heart, truly...I miss the finer things in life. Oh, I guess one big difference is the splendour of alcohol available at this Costco...veeery nice. I didn't splurge, but there was a pretty pretty nice selection of wine.

Note: why am I writing about food? Perhaps I'm hungry? I think not though...onto the funny stuff ;)

So the aisles were totally jam-packed with carts and slow-moving human beings, but this Costco is not full of impatient Caucasians but, rather, patient and very careful Asians (and their children...some asleep peacefully in large carts). God. So we were in Costco for about three hours in total, honestly. It was painful. But really very funny. The great part is that practically no one speaks English and if they do, they completely do not understand the slang and the quick wit we spew out while shopping. So its hilarious to drive along the aisles, ranting and raving, laughing and joking, marvelling at the selection of Fruit by the Foot, ketchup, and kimchi, but not of much else we hold near and dear. The samples were pretty nice though.

I'm tired and actually sore...excuse the lack of wit. I might stay in tonight and enjoy the four English channels on my big tv, thanks to my newly-installed cable. AND internet, might I add...finally :)