I see my name is mentioned over at Sawatdee Forum, as an example of a farang who is a 7-Eleven customer and therefore contributes to the death of the small family-operated shops in the sois.
In my soi we have both. We have the 7-Eleven, bright and clean and air conditioned and open 24 hours. We also have the traditional shops. How do they compare?
In the family shop you get the pleasure of climbing over sleeping dogs and cats. The owner is an old Chinese guy and his toothless wife. The Chinese guy is shirtless and fat and sweaty, sitting in a corner swatting flies. The wife is half blind and shuffles around in her plastic sandals.
The shop is open to the road and there is no air condition and hardly any light.
No products are marked with a price. You have to ask. Nobody cares about expiry dates. The owners watch you with suspicion and grumplily ask what you want. They don’t encourage you to look around. Buy what you came for and get out.
They keep the money in a basket which they pull down from the ceiling. They don’t have any formal opening or closing hours, but are generally open whenever they are not sleeping or away. Hygiene consists of sweeping the concrete floor with a broom now and then.
As for the local economy, the soi shop may provide a living of sort for a family, but the 7-Elevens employ thousands of young people, most of them from upcountry. The pay is not bad by Thailand standards.
I don’t go to the soi shop. It is not an inviting place. I would go there if they could compete with the 7-Eleven, but these dirtly little holes can’t. Is it tragic that they are disappearing? Not really. I can’t bring myself to be romantic about them.
Tags: 7 Eleven, Thailand
May 1st, 2008 at 12:19 pm
But you’ll miss the photos of their relatives on their walls!
May 1st, 2008 at 8:17 pm
There are two neighborhood family shops near where I live and they are identical to your descriptions down to the old fat shirtless Chinese guy in the corner and his wife. Must be some sort of Union Family corner store rule.
May 2nd, 2008 at 12:21 am
Couldn’t agree more.
May 2nd, 2008 at 2:10 am
even Thai people don’t go to those shops…..so
we should not blame the miniscule Farang population if their own people don’t go there….
their own people don’t frequent those places, for
the same reason Farang don’t….
That is why they don’t do more than enough business to feed them from day to day.
If they want customers they should clean up their acts and offer some service….
I did freqent the local family drug stores, and found
them to be very helpful. They were clean and the owners most polite. (It also helped that the cost of
my prescription drugs was cheaper there than Boots.)
I don’t particularly care for 7-11, but they are handy and you can find what you need without having to ask “how much” for every little item.
May 2nd, 2008 at 10:36 am
7-11 is convenient, but the attitude of the staff is important. They must not be lackadaisical on matters relating to food safety; as highlighted in one of your previous posts about the duration a piece of burger is placed in the microwave to render if save for consumption. Safety aside, some of the boys are cute & yummy!
May 3rd, 2008 at 9:27 pm
My local Family Mart hires two ladyboys. They are not too cute but they wai me and say Kop Khun Ka. Can’t get that kind of attention at the Chinese Shops.