an email i sent to meg about thrift stores that may just be the most intelligent observation i have made yet about south korea

hey meg!

i noticed that you said that you like garage sales and goodwill stores. these are also things that i like a lot and i was really excited to experience them in south korea. except, it turns out they don't have anything of the sort here. i've spent weeks pondering why this should be, and it finally dawned on me that it's because koreans don't throw things away until they are completely trashed and they don't get rid of things that still have the slightest tweak of use in them. in order to have decent garage sales and goodwill stores, you need to be in a society where the citizens get rid of things that may still have some worth to others, and that just doesn't ever happen here. ever. but i like other people's old stuff. it has character! and i'm sure old korean people's stuff has lots of character! there's one store downtown here that pretends to be a thrift store, but anything that looks old and interesting is actually not for sale. this bummed me out, as i made a special trip there to purchase two specific items for my advisors as thank you gifts, and had the funny experience of pacing around the store picking up items, mumbling "how much" in korean, and getting a big fat "yeah i won't sell that to you" from the rather unfriendly lady who works there every time. humph. anything old and with character here is actually very rare and valuable.
this is a situation that i never had thought of before. i've thought that for the excess and wastefulness of american culture to change, we could all shop thrift for clothes and furniture, etc. but now i see that it's not actually true. without excess and wastefulness, there is no thrift! what a sacrifice to make! but i think i'd have to take the loss of excess along with the loss of thrift stores.
korea is quickly becoming a consumerist society and i think that things like thrift stores may be popping up in the near future. apparently stuff has changed a lot in the last ten years, and our generation may have some good clothes to throw out. not that any of that will fit over my ginormous rear end. however, they will probably never have a goodwill. they don't have welfare here. it's sink or swim as far as the government is concerned. and people who sink are really frowned upon by society as a whole. you rarely see homeless people on the street. i have seen maybe 3 all together in all the cities i have been through so far, including seoul. so thrift stores would mainly be there to serve tourists and korean hippies and rastas, and well actually i don't know who would shop there. i don't know the culture well enough to know whether or not it would be taboo for your average joe to shop at a thrift store in korea. hmm . . . this is going to tickle my brain now for the next few days.
so enjoy your goodwill and garage sales! they sure are wonderful in montreal.


:)
erin