Problem with Coffee Machines, Subway Ticket Machines

This afternoon didn't have 200 won change for a coffee from the machine so took a 1000 bill, like a Korean version of the $1 bill, which I thought seemed new and crisp enough. This has happened enough times but today I was surprised when the machine wouldn't take the bill. Tried it one way, then another. Held it and smoothed it a few times, tried again, and again, then smoothed it a few more times  (did this first two fingers of right hand, one finger on each side, holding one end of bill in other hand, kind of pulling it with two fingers.) Then put in again, came out. I then thought to just keeping trying and after another 1-2 times it worked. So total was close to 10 times I tried putting it in before I had success. This really was a new-looking bill that hadn't been in my wallet for more than a day or think since someone gave it to me as change.

One time in the subway the ticket machine was spitting my bill out over and over. I was thinking to just keep trying and it will eventually be taken. After a certain number of times, I guess between 5-10, I hit the machine. Soon after a young Korean man wearing his military uniform came to help me. The machine finally took my bill or I used another one, I can't remember, but I got my ticket. I talked with the man for a little while while walking towards the train. He told me that the government bought machines like this one that didn't work very well because they didn't want to spend the money for better machines. You could tell he thought they were cheapskates and didn't like them doing this.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shutting Metal Apartment Doors at Night

This isn't nice but I'm going to go ahead and write it anyway. I did write about this before. I'd give anything if Koreans of all ages could shut their apartment doors quietly, not necessary really quietly, but normally, just making a little noise. The door to my current apartment and others I've had is made of metal. The one I have now is all gray metal, a little thick. When someone in my apartment building shuts their door it makes quite a noise. When someone near me does it it's impossible not to hear it. Sometimes there's a vibration in my apartment. Last night I woke up around 1am likely due to some noise outside my apartment. It could've been a door shutting loudly but I can't say. While I was awake I heard someone walk up the steps by my apartment to a higher floor. I could hear it but it wasn't really too loud. I heard them go up to the 2nd floor or maybe a little past and then didn't hear anything. About two minutes later though I hear...
Read more

Map Showing Maternity Leave Around the World Including South Korea

http://twistedsifter.com/2013/08/maps-that-will-help-you-make-sense-of-the-world/ I have a hard time with the map on maternity leave. It shows that South Koreans get more than six months. I've never heard anything like that. As I know they get three months paid leave, but many women don't actually get that. Two Stories At a hagwon where I worked one Korean woman was about to have her first child. The Korean teachers told me she'd take two months off unpaid. I said something about thinking she should be paid and one teacher said that the hagwon may do that in the future if they became more well off. That's the way I remember it. About two years ago a Korean friend's wife was going to have a baby. As I know she worked in an office. Her company told her that they couldn't afford to pay for her maternity leave. She didn't care because she wanted to take care of her baby. My friend told me she got compensation from the government, he said 600-700,000 K...
Read more