A filk community

But first!

I've said the traffic here was calm. That seems true of daytime Seoul. Today there was even a car waiting to make a mid-block left turn that waited for us pedestrians to clear rather than making a break for it like I expected. But at night? At 21:00? Then the streets are clear, and many drivers race at speed, whether in straight lines or making fast turns. And one motorcycle totally blew through a red light. Yaaay.

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I forgot to say -- the Emart supermarket had unit price by weight for everything except the bananas. Per 100 grams usually, but per 10 grams for cannned fish and pupae. Much better than Japan. Though, bread nutrition per 100 grams is useful, but per slice would be nice too.

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I did some websearching on "neighborhood supermarkets" in Seoul, and got a few chains: Emart Everyday, Lotte Super, GS Fresh, No Brand. Map searching made me still feel I was in a desert, but an Emart Everyday showed up some distance to my west, so I tried that today. But first I sought the alleged markets north of me on Naver -- mid-afternoon, so they should still be open, right?

Right, found them. A series of what felt like mini-warehouses, lots of random items each, no obvious organization, a obvious price labels, and shopkeepers who stared me with a "wtf are you doing here?" feel. Between them you could probably get a lot of household goods and microwave rice and snacks; nothing fresh, but there are other small shops for that. I moved on.

Convenience stores continue to suck by Japanese standards, at least from a grocery POV. Mostly no vegetables, though last night I did get a 1600 won pack of salad greens (no dressing, but I can eat them with cherry tomato, or in a cheese sandwich.) Stores might have eggs, cooked meats, wheat noodles, rarely spaghetti or sauce, canned tuna. No tofu. Canned silkworm pupae, those must be popular.

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Good news: I obtained cash and found groceries.

I did some research last night, and found advice on using Global ATMs, plus warnings that they still don't work randomly. Today I first hit Shinsan bank -- Global ATM, but no English menu. Moved on to Woori, and their first ATM was great. I got cash from one card, successful inquiry on another, and... not sure about the other two, one of which may simply not work. Anyway, progress!( Read more... )

This has been a day.

Last night I realized that my 10:30 flight could mean leaving at 7:30, given dire warnings about Peach Air being strict about deadlines. I decided to spent 1200 yen and move to a 14:20 flight, yeah that meant 3.5 hours in the airport, but it also meant not rushing out in the morning, and a bigger chance to get sleep.

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June 28 -- Mucha Museum

Back in April, between Taiwan and Hokkaido, I'd visited Sakai, a suburb? smaller city? south of Osaka, for a failed aerial view of kofun tombs. I discovered then that there's an Alphonse Mucha museum. Sunday I finally went to it -- it was easier than I expected, from my base in Tengachaya. Album It's not very big, basically one floor of works, with a bit of spillover. Probably not worth a major detour (like going to Osaka for it.) Key info signs are bilingual, and I learned of the Paris craze for posters, and Mucha putting himself into as much advertising and product labeling as possible, like biscuit tins and perfume sprays and such. Also Czech currency and postal stamps.

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Extending from the fast food burger emulation... someone online had disputed cooking being cheaper than eating out, and specifically mentioned Taco Bell value menu, Little Caesars, and unspecified hole-in-the-wall places. Well, I can evaluate the first two. Instead of my prior approach of trying to build an exact match for a burger, I'll try something more holistic.

(And yeah, this whole thing feels like belaboring the obvious to me. But apparently it's not actually obvious to many people.)

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Getting 2000 calories via Taco Bell burritos in Philly would take $11.45; doing it via burrito ingredients would take less than $6.97 (the price of living on canned black beans.) If you had been spending $11.45/day, you could switch to making your own, and use the savings to buy some actual vegetables as well.

Which leads to another argument I've repeatedly seen people make[1], that "eating healthy" is more expensive than fast food, because vegetables are so expensive, as if you're supposed to jump from burgers and pizza to living on spinach and eggplant. But humans can't live on non-starchy vegetables! Fast food is some mix of protein, carbs, and fat, and so is the bulk of homemade food; healthiness comes from using better ingredients and knowing what's going into the mix, not from jumping ship entirely to vegetables that are mostly water, fiber, and micronutrients. A burger diet is competing with whole grains and legumes plus some vegetables, or something like that, rather than competing with a salad diet.

[1] I guess proving by self-example that some adults don't know the first thing about nutrition or cooking.