Saturday Eric took me to Lotte Mart (pronounced Lot-tee). It’s Korea’s answer to WalMart. Except imagine WalMart on steroids…massive, mega doses of  capitalist-pumping steroids.

There’s Lotte World, Lotte Hotels, Lotte Housing, Lotte Galaxy, Lotte Plaza…on & on.

It’s more than just food distribution – it’s tourism, construction, heavy chemicals, finance, information services, welfare – you name it, they got it. (It’s kind of frightening, actually.)

I was all set to take lots of pictures, but when we arrived there was a very big & very clear sign on the door – NO CAMERAS.

So I’m afraid you’ll just have use your imagination until Eric takes me again & I get brave enough to smuggle out a picture or two.

But back to the story at hand…

Maybe it was the weather (cloudy gray & wanting to rain). Maybe it was the fact that I was feeling sick as a dog before we even left the house. Or maybe it just was too much to take in all at once.

Whatever it was, my trip to Lotte Mart was not the happy, cultural excursion Eric had hoped it would be.

Oh, it started off interesting enough…

• Driving up the parking garage to find a place to park in their 6 floor mega shopping complex.
• Recognizing as we drove in – how will we know what sign says parking & what sign says exit. Everything’s in Korean.
• Realizing once inside the store that the escalators weren’t exactly escalators so much as they were steep rolling ramps. (Imagine an escalator without the stairs.)
• Seeing every counter, every end-cap aisle, every nook & cranny had a lovely little uniformed Korean woman standing at full attention – beckoning shoppers to buy her wares.

The store was filled with vibrantly colored products, display signs everywhere and packed with people bustling to go here or there.

• We passed the women’s lingerie aisle – beautifully embroidered & delicate bras…with nothing but A’s & AA’s as far as the eye could see. (Not a single 38C in sight. In fact, I’m not sure there were any B’s.)
• We walked down the dog food aisle – no meaty-flavored rawhide chew bones in various twisted shapes to choose from. It was tiny little dried duck rolls & dried-flat squid. (Perfect for the Little One, not so much for Maggie Moo.)
• We strolled through the appliance aisle – stand-up air conditioning units in deep, high-polished reds & blues for way too much won.
• We somehow made it past the make-up counter without getting snagged. The beautiful, tiny little porcelain doll-like women were every 5 feet there! All hawking skin-care products.

And as we meandered through floor after floor, it hit me.

I started feeling worse & worse. I felt like I would collapse at any moment. I wanted out. And I wanted out fast.

Eric had wanted to find the restaurant some guys claimed was inside the store – but we didn’t see anything like that. There was a made-to-order counter with a few stools around, but not what he was expecting. So he graciously took me home where I immediately collapsed on the bed & slept for a good 4 – 6 hours.

It was just too much that day.