HomePlus, Shopping, and Sundays

After telling you so much about HomePlus and Lotte Mart, we thought it would be a good idea to explain a little more and give you a look into the basic Korean shopping experience.  Here is the exterior of the infamous HomePlus.  Owned by Samsung, apparently it is the company Samsung uses when it needs to "move funds around."  Regardless, it has most things that westerners want.  As you can see, this building is pretty big.  The first floor is a food court type area and the next floor is the grocery store.  Next is the floor with most household goods, office supplies, pets, tvs, and furniture. No pictures of those yet, but someday...

So despite having so many western foods, it is still very much an Asian goods store...as you can see here from the whole isle full of red pepper paste and soy sauce.  Red pepper paste is added to most foods, so naturally they need 50 different varieties.

Equally important are the choices of soy sauce.  You may be wondering 

what could be so hard about choosing soy sauce, but again the variety is overwhelming.  There are different kinds for fish, chicken, vegetables, rice, and other meats; it's a big decision.  Here you can see Jon is bewildered by the important decision that lies before him.

Also important is the ramyeon, or the Korean equivalent of ramen noodles. Just in case the red pepper  paste and soy sauce don't provide enough sodium, one can always cook up one of umpteen varieties of these instant noodles and snack away.  Being that variety is the spice of life and Koreans do love spice, there naturally must be another entire aisle dedicated just these instant snacks.  

Sundays are the busiest grocery shopping days of the week, at least so far as we have been able to tell.  Here is Jon checking out after a tiring shopping excursion.  As you can see, HomePlus really is a large, very modern grocery store.  You can also see how crowded it gets.  It is nearly impossible to walk 3 feet without someone bumping into you.

After facing the hustle and bustle of Sunday shopping in HomePlus, there really is only one thing left to do...