The local Mongolian BBQ place near my home which I go often recently had their POS terminal upgraded gratis by the acquirer. It used be this really old non-colored swipe only Ingenico machine, now it's a full color LED display with both the mag-stripe swipe and the EMV chip slot. No explanation was given except to "use this from now on and return the old terminal."

Probably the acquirer is preparing for EMV I assume.

Nothing happens when I try inserting the chip card though, still do it via swipe. Hopefully we get to see places where EMV is activated soon here in the US so people start getting acquainted with it. For int'l travelers in the US, it would be nice to see it in direct action before heading out to other countries so we don't get caught with surprises, like a "test your new EMV card on how it works at the local bank branch" or something. Maybe it might warrant another separate Google Docs spreadsheet as it gets turned on and reports start flying in where it started working?