A small shop? What's an incredible concept. Who would have thunk it?
America truly is the land of innovation.
That's not true. A bodega is a corner store with a plexiglass container for staff because they're in a shithole.
Yeah but if you show them your ass they might sell you some weed
Black ass!
Keep your bodegas. Ain't none of you guys can beat our local gas station/post office//DMV/liquor store/UPS pickup point. We don't even need a special name for it. It's just The Store. Sure it's not within walking distance. But then not even the neighbors are either.
You can fill up your car, get your mail, buy new tabs for that car/boat/UTV/truck or get a fishing/hunting license, buy a 12 pack of beer, send a fax to your parole officer, and buy a gallon of milk with a frozen pizza to either cook there or take it home. It also has 2 tables and 5 chairs to relax at, (no purchase necessary). I know people who do all of that in one visit.
The only one of these I’m familiar with was deep in the North woods of Wisconsin, but it really was the do-everything infrastructure of the town. IIRC also had propane, ice, fishing stuff, automotive basics, local community bulletin boards, a few old arcade cabinets, and although inside seemed bigger than outside it was only as big as a medium-sized deli in NY.
And I thought the gas station/courthouse I saw was wild.
Yeah, they didn't go quite that far.
A bodega is a corner store owned by the guy behind the counter.
Most corner stores in most places these days are run by regional managers of franchisees who hire Clerky The Clowns to work the counter and have to keep producing numbers for corporate.
I ain't explaining shit. It's a bodega, fuck you. Have a nice day.
Wait till I tell Americans that small discount supermarkets exist within walking distance in Denmark.
Wait until they find out Denmark is filled with Danish people.
wait, you mean like people made out of pastries, or . . . ?
No, it's even worse
Pastries made out of people?
Good god, no!
Nyc is one of the few cities that you can walk in though
Kamelåsa
These comments are so weird. I only found out what a bodega was recently, so I've added it to my brain as "corner shop". I didn't even know they were peculiar to a specific area until this post.
So they're corner shops. Everything people comment about them being different still comes under the umbrella of "corner shop". It's weird to see people yapping about how they're different and then giving reasons that... still mean corner shop.
I've always called them "convenience stores", but, yeah, same thing. I once worked with a woman who took me to this place on our break which she introduced by saying "Okay, I'm not trying to be racist, but I honestly don't know what else to call this place. It's a chink shop." So, I'm wondering what this store is going to be like. We walk in, and...it's a fuckin' convenience store. Which happened to be run by Asians.
Diaclamer: never been to new york or any store that called itself a bodega.
I think its similar to "all bodegas are corner shops but not all corner shops are bodegas". They have unique features that group them closer to eachother than to most other corner stores. But they are still a corner store.
All poodles are dogs but some people just prefer poodles.
NYC here.
If someone asked the average New Yorker what a bodega was, the most probable answer is "What are you, stupid?"
Not me, because I would be mugging you.
Taiwanese laughs in local 7-11 or FamilyMart
boodegas, you say, and you're not a little bit suspicious that it is far too close to the term bottega, italian for general all purpose shop and conmercial activity? like, 'aprire bottega' - 'starting a business'? And i know for a fact that NY is full of Italians.
What's disappointing is that bodegas are as close to a "third space" as you're likely to get. It's not a place you're meant to hang out, there isn't even seating, and you are supposed to buy something. And yet, there's a hint at some kind of community.
UK, Ireland and Australia have a slight improvement on that with pubs. They're also commercial establishments, but culturally it's more of a community thing. It's also not just about alcohol. You can get a hot meal too. Even if someone isn't going out to hang out with friends down at the pub, it's often perfectly normal to go there and eat alone while reading a book. Even that is a bit of a community activity, because you'll see some of the same faces and exchange greetings or at least waves or nods.
Places with serious winters (and I'm including NYC in that), really should have third spaces that are not for profit and designed for various kinds of hanging out: board games, indoor sports, gaming, cooking. That just doesn't seem to be a common thing in the English speaking world, at least for adults.
Til https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place
In sociology, the third place refers to the social surroundings that are separate from the two usual social environments of home ("first place") and workplace ("second place"). Examples of third places include churches, cafes, bars, clubs, libraries, gyms, bookstores, hackerspaces, stoops, parks, and theaters, among others.
So after reading through all the valuable comments here it seems like a bodega is a way to say you live in New York while trying to not seem like you're bragging about it but you actually try to brag about it
new yorkers think having an american, chinese, indian, italian, and mexican restaurant to choose from makes them unique. im not even kidding i saw a new yorker tweet that those choices can only be found in new york city
Lol, maybe if it was 1980.
Corner stores in NYC have some advantages, competition. If
In the burbs and rural areas, the stores are spread out, and if you have a shitty store a couple miles closer than a decent store, they can just produce the cheapest crap and sell it to you for exorbatent prices.
New Yorkers are ok with walking a few blocks. So if your corner shop can't complete another one 2 minutes away will draw away their customers.
Even corner shops in Baltimore and DC are pretty anemic comparatively, but they tend to have more actual restaurants peppered about.
The real magic is I can walk to several open bodegas almost any time of day or night.
I've heard some bodegas have cats
I'm from Chicago and I've never been to NYC. From what I've heard about bodegas however, the difference seems to be that a bodega requires a cat.
Huh, I've always assumed that a bodega is a shop akin to those Japanese 7-11 stores. Like the kinda store that you see in those CCTV recordings of horses breaking through automatic store doors.
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Don't be mean. I promise to do my best to judge that fairly.
