Banking Issues & Lazy Salesmen

I went shopping to Itaewon recently. Itaewon is, more or less, a long street of shops (in the Korean sense of the word). The stores are really different though. There are a lot of "alley stores," where you have to turn into what looks like an alley and then proceed to go down a dozen or so steep stairs into a basement. Usually such stores sell shoes, but some of them sell clothing as well. There are a lot of brand names available here, but they are all rip-offs. By that I mean they are the Korean version of Gap, Nike, Tommy "Hillfinger," or "Abercrobbie." There are some nice things though, and the differences are negligible. There is a lot of neat jewelry and traditional Korean ceramics to be bought in Itaewon as well. I bought a really neat bracelet with little pictures of Buddha on it for the equivalent of 75 cents Canadian.

Here is a glimpse into the rather unique Korean culture for you: We were in an "alley market" and Tobi, one of the teachers with whom I had gone shopping, had seen a pair of shoes that she liked. However, the shoes were in a store -- this particular alley had a number of stores in the basement -- the door to which was closed. However, on the door (and here's the Korean culture for you) there was a post-it note which read "call me," and listed a cell phone number. In other words, the store owner/worker did not want to stay in the store so he had left, believing that anyone interested in buying a pair of shoes would call him... Strange logic. Wouldn't most people just leave, finding shoes at a different store? Anyway, we asked the guy in the next store, which sold traditional Asian dresses, and he called out a guys name, and soon a young Korean guy came down the stairs and opened up the store. He had been visiting with shopkeepers upstairs on the main street...

The Korean asked the cops to escort me to the bank machine, just in case I could not find it myself!

On Sunday, I was wandering around my neighborhood looking for a bank machine. As I discovered, they are rather sparse in Korea... Anyway, I was able find one, but it did not accept international cards. However, I had remembered that in Itaewon the bank machines that had the "Cirrus" symbol on them accepted international cards. With this in mind, I set out to find such a machine in my area. I kept asking Koreans, on the street and in the stores, if they could direct me to an international bank machine. I had looked up the words in the dictionary for those that did not know English. They all directed me to the same bank, but it was the one which I already knew would not accept my card. Finally, a Korean remembered another bank that was just around the corner. He directed me to it, and just as I about to leave, two police officers walked by. The Korean asked the cops to escort me to the bank machine, just in case I could not find it myself.

Just picture this: Tracy, a foreigner, being walked to a bank by two Korean police officers!! A few minutes, and many odd stares, later we arrived at the bank... only to find it undergoing renovations, and the bank machines closed... I was about to give up, except that I had one last idea — getting money out at a store which accepts interac. I went a large bookstore — of the underground alley variety — and tried out my idea. I was going to buy a magazine (in Korean, the only type sold) and get extra money out. When I tried to explain such a concept to the man behind the till, he flipped. "This is not a bank!" Obviously, the concept of withdrawing extra cash at a store is a purely western one. However, two ladies overhead my plea for cash and wondered why I needed to get cash out. I told them I had only wanted to get some money because I did not get paid for a couple of days, and actually only wanted money to get a coffee or something to drink. They were very nice, and knew a fair bit of English, so we talked for quite a while in the bookstore. They then invited me to McDonalds (right next door) for a milkshake, their treat. The funny thing is that the two women did not even know each other before they had started talking to me. Anyway, we talked for a while, exchanged phone numbers, and I now may be tutoring the one woman's daughter...