Everything in Korea is exactly the same as it is in the States. There are no differences whatsoever. (sike!) This is our first of what will most likely turn out to be many posts about the things here that are different than what we are used to. God has a way of using cultural differences to make us more well rounded people (insert pregnant joke here). So, let’s begin.

As we have mentioned before, tipping is basically nonexistent in Korea (with the exception of food delivery, etc.). People do their jobs, and that’s that. Also, as we have mentioned before, it is customary to remove your shoes before entering homes and some public places. It is rude to wear your shoes indoors no matter how good you look in them. As a very pregnant lady at this point, I am making a conscious effort to wear slip ons, as reaching my feet is a skill I lost a few weeks back…

So on to a few new things we have noticed:

Recycling

Koreans recycle everything; even in stores and in parks there are separate trashcans designated for specific items be it plastic, glass, cans, or apparently even small domestic animals…

Sidewalks

You know the painted stripes in the road which divide traffic? Those are on sidewalks here, too.

Hand soap

We’ve had quite a difficult time finding hand soap for our bathrooms. We finally thought we had found some and bought two bottles of it, but come to find out it was just dish soap with a pump… sigh. There goes our silky soft hands.

Public restrooms

Mama always said, “Korean public restrooms are like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.” This is a photo of the inside of a stall in the ladies’ room at the family park near our apartment.

And apparently they don’t want you stealing their crappy public restroom soap. Isaac took this picture in a restroom along the river:

Markets

There are many stores that have roughly half of their produce on the street so people walking by can see what they have.

We also have viewed some interesting practices of food safety…

Prices

Taxes are included already in the price you see at the store, so if it says a dollar, you pay a dollar. And like we said about tipping, food prices eating out may look really high, but taxes are included and you don’t tip, so it’s not bad.

We have found groceries in general to be a bit more pricey, especially fruit.

Just for fun

You may be interested to know that Asian Mr. Clean has hair.

Moving in

In a city like Seoul, most of the apartment complexes are high-rise towers, which makes moving in furniture a challenge, but they have a really cool way of getting furniture up to families’ homes.

Brooms

Of all of the differences that we expected to encounter, brooms were not among our foremost concerns. Our broom is so tiny, Judah thinks it’s a toy. When we brought it home Judah assumed it was for him. Since we are right in the middle of teaching Judah about sharing (you’re welcome, Asher), we now have to wait our turn to use the broom to sweep the floor (I am not kidding).

I expect we will soon look like this:

That’s it for now…sending love from the future.