Rural “comfortable shops” fighting loneliness

Hee-Kyung is giggling when she steps into the new Seoul’s “Shop for Amenities”.

At 29, she may not be the person who would have imagined that she wanted to take advantage of the most efforts of the capital of South Korea to combat loneliness.

But Hee-Kyung visits every day to grab the free immediate noodle of Ramen and spend hours chatting with other visitors and social workers.

“I say to myself,” Another day, another escape from the feeling of lonely, “says He-Kun.

A teenager escape, she no longer talks to anyone in her family. The friends she has met online through the shared love of the K-POP Group Superjunior and they live far away. She is currently unemployed, she has no working friends to talk to.

She lives alone and smears the time when she watches sweet animal videos on her phone while lying on the floor.

“I have no other place to go if it wasn’t (the store).”

Hee-Kyung is one of 20,000 people visiting the four stores since they were opened in March. The city only expected 5,000 in the first year.

This particular place, in the northeast neighborhood of Dondemun, sees about 70 to 80 visitors every day.

Most are in the 1940s and 50s, but Hee-Kyung is far from the only young person who has access to store services.

A survey of 2022 revealed approximately 130,000 young people in the city – those between the ages of 19 and 39 – are either socially isolated or closed. The same survey found that the share of households with one person in the capital reached nearly 40% – which has worried a government trying to turn that it has reduced the birth rate and marriage.

On the day he visited the BBC, about a dozen visitors – men and women, young and old – were sitting on benches or crammed into bags, watching a movie together.

“We have movie days to encourage low-level connecting,” Kim Sese-Hon, manager of the loneliness of the city’s loneliness.

The stores are designed to offer a warm, coffee -like atmosphere. In one corner, a more old woman closed her eyes as she sank into an automatic massage chair that was humming. In another there are piles of noodles.

“The shoulder is a symbol of comfort and warmth in South Korea,” Kim explains.

While waiting for the noodles to cook, visitors are asked to complete a short survey on their mood and living conditions.

These are just a handful of the increasing number of socially isolated people to whom the city is trying to reach.

The change in South Korea has undergone seismic: in a generation it has moved from a torn agricultural society to a developed economy.

A few decades ago, it was customary to see large families with six to eight children living under one roof. But years of migration in the cities have shrunk families and have turned places like Seoul into scattered metropolis.

Independent homes, increasing costs and exhausting hours have led more and more young people to reject marriage or parenting or both. On the other hand, it is an aging population that feels neglected by children who compete to continue.

“Do you know the saying that the least delicious meal is the one you have alone? I ask older people who come in if they eat well. They will be torn apart, they will just ask this question,” says Lee in-Sook, the advisor in the store.

After a divorce and her grown -up children who leave home, she realizes how she feels to be alone.

The first time He -Kun – who is around the daughter of in -sook – arrived at the store, she immediately caught her eye.

Like many visitors, He-Kun was quiet on the first day, almost talking to others. The second time she came, she started talking to In-Sook.

It was the increasing number of “lonely deaths” that worried Seoul’s employees, enough to act. The elderly died alone at home, and their bodies were not found for days or weeks later.

This mission soon expanded to dealing with loneliness itself. But Seoul is not the first to do this.

In 2018, the United Kingdom appointed a minister of loneliness. Japan followed the example, creating an agency to deal with the problem that he said became more pronounced in the Covid-19 pandemic.

The phenomenon of withdrawal from society is entirely Common enough in Japan that there is a name: hikikomoriS In South Korea and South Korea were a growing number of young people voluntarily cut off from a highly competitive and demanding societyS

“Perhaps it was the pandemic that led to it,” Lee Yu-Yong thinks, who manages one of the Seoul’s Linery programs.

She points out how her children remain buried in their smartphones when their friends visit. “People today express how difficult it is to have a network of friends. Loneliness has become something that has to deal with a society.”

The first step was to open a hot line for people they needed by someone to talk to. A national survey in 2023 found that one -third of adults in Korea was gone or no one would ask for assistance in housework or to speak when he feels sad.

Its advisers offer a 40-minute call to discuss any topic. Park Seung-A makes three calls a day from its cabin.

“I was surprised to see that many young people wanted these sessions. They want to share the weight of their breasts, but there is often a dynamics of power with their parents or friends. So they come to us.”

The Warm Heart’s comfort stores followed a quick, physical place where the lonely were welcome.

The location of Dongdaemun was chosen because of its proximity to low -income homes, where residents live only in small, subdivided apartments.

The 68 -year -old Son visits the store once a week to watch movies and escape from his narrow home.

“(Stores) had to open before I was born. It’s good to spend even two to three hours,” he says.

Son has spent more than five decades of his life, taking care of his mother, who suffered a brain aneurysm when he was a child. As a result, he never married or had children.

The price of dedication became clear when she died.

Without money and walking with a cane, since he has suffered cerebral hemorrhage a few years ago, he says there are not many places for him.

“Places are worth money, going to the movies is worth money,” he says.

The stores are created specifically to welcome those who are not welcome in other places, explains store manager Lee Bo-Hun.

They exceed a little space and a movie – offering air conditioning during the hottest summer months of low -incomes that cannot afford it at home.

This is supposed to be a space where lonely can bypass the stigma to ask for help. Choosing a name – “Amenities Shops” – was a deliberate attempt to distance them from psychiatric clinics, important in a country where there is still a stigma against a request for mental health assistance – especially among the older residents.

However, some of their reservations can still be seen when they enter the door for the first time, complicated by their experience of isolation.

Visitors are often unpleasant to talk to another person or to eat together initially, says store manager Lee.

“Typical loneliness, if this is repeated for days, months and half a year, this is more than a feeling now,” Lee explains.

“These people start to avoid places with people. So many people ask us if they can take the ram to go because they will not eat with others.”

Lee would tell them no need to talk. They can just sit on the same table and have noodles.

Months have passed since Hee-Kyung has been one of the quiet new arrivals.

So, does it matter? In-Sook remembers a conversation he had with local paper. When she raised her daughter, she felt a sudden Pang and her voice broke.

“I’ll hug you,” He-Kun said.

She approached the other side of the room and hugged In-Sook.