The Pharmacy for All
The place
The information ground that I have unknowingly observed for many years is a small pharmacy owned by my father. It is located in a residential, middle to high class neighborhood in Seoul, Korea. Due to the close-knit nature of such residential neighborhoods, there’s very little that goes hidden. Many families have been living there for many years through births, deaths, and just about every major event in their lives. Since our pharmacy is located almost central to and at the corner of a major street in this neighborhood, it became a place where people come to gather.
The “regulars”
The people who regularly come to the pharmacy are middle-aged housewives. They come to the pharmacy on their way to and/or from the market and stay for hours at a time. They are at the pharmacy almost every day although they don’t usually have a specific medical reason to drop by. For the middle-aged housewives in Korea, the pharmacy is a place where they share information about everything. The pharmacy is in a way a therapy session for middle aged women who have mostly devoted their lives to their family and very little to themselves.
The “regular customers”
The regular customers are those who come to the pharmacy when they are sick, or are in need of medicine or health advice. They can be any age from very young children accompanied by their parents to the seniors who have been retired for many years. The pharmacy, in this case, is like a substitute hospital. The hospitals are usually far away and the wait is often very long.
The pharmacy is also a place of a group therapy session. While waiting for their medicine they discuss their worries and find a sense of relief in sharing their worries with another person or getting advice from others in the pharmacy about any problems they might be facing.
The “transients”
The “transients” are of any age group. Usually, these are people who are not from the immediate neighborhood. The “transients” usually have an embarrassing information need. Teenagers often come to get birth control pills or condoms or the wives of husbands who abuse them or are alcoholics. To them, the pharmacy is like an anonymous advice center. Teenagers get a sex education they might never get anywhere else. The wives might find courage to talk about their problems.
E. Sally Lee