iCarly episode: iHeart Mini Stop

A prominent convenience store in America is 7/11, and Korea actually does have a number of them, too. But the convenience store industry, at least from what I have observed in Seoul, is dominated by two companies. They pretty much have the exact same kind of store.

The first is “Mini Stop.” They are all over the place. You can’t walk two blocks (in any direction) without going past one. I think Mini-Stop is a brilliant and hilarious name. First of all, they really are mini. Each one has three aisles, similar to a place like PC Mart. But, the aisles are short in height- they reach about my shoulders, and I’m not a tall person. They are also short in length, the average person could take about three or four steps and get from one end to the other. In general, the entire store is packed in tightly, yet you don’t feel claustrophobic when you walk within. It’s efficient.

There is a “Mini Stop” (again, isn’t that such a great and cute name?) attached to the lobby of the building I live in, which is very nice. There are two entrances to the lobby: you could walk into the mart and swipe your card into the building from that side door, or just go through the front door. More to come on the amazingness of my building in a future update.

The main competitor for Mini Stop is “Family Mart.” You can find these littered about the city just as often as the Mini Stop, if not a little bit more. I find the name Family Mart funny too, because it suggests the imagery that a large, loving family of five should take a trip down to the ‘Mart to pick up snacks/convenience store items for the week…with an aura of wholesome excitement in the air. What’s funny about this hypothetical scenario is that if a family of a mere five people all went into one Family Mart, it would be noticeably and inconveniently crowded for other customers.

The clerks that work the register at continence stores are very quick-acting. When you give your things to be scanned they do so very fast. The first time I bought a couple of items from that store I was still in the process of orienting myself with the value of the Korean Currency (won, also to be covered in more detail in a future post). I was shifting through my wallet and sort of reaching for a 10,000 won bill (which is green), not really knowing what to pay with. He saw my 5,000 won bill (blue) and imperatively pointed at it, uttering a brief remark (in Korean) that it was the bill he wanted.

Once I gave it to him and he gave me my change, our transaction was complete. In Korea once you have finished doing business in this manner, the employee concludes the affair with a social-ritualistic bow. You might envision a drawn-out, almost ninety degree bow, like in movies, i.e. when Morpheus fights Neo in the training program (STOP TRYING TO HIT ME AND HIT ME!!!). But, the bows from a convenience store clerk, in fitting with the quick-acting vibe of Seoul, bow only a little, and very quickly, but never (at least in my experience in this area thus far) without at least some sort of smile to convey approval and good wishes.