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Weirdly Sympathetic Drama with Realistic Sense, ‘Eun-joo’s Room’
CONIST | 탁정은
| 2020-01-03 14:59
People commonly say to us to have dream saying it’s good to live chasing dream. However, how many people in Korea are chasing their own dreams instead of worrying about living. Maybe it is possible for those who are in their early twenties, but for those who are old enough and having jobs and family, chasing their own dreams instead of worrying about their living is not an easy choice. There will be many problems in daily lives and sometimes they will confront the wall of reality.
In this article, I’m going to introduce a webtoon titled ‘Eun-joo’s Room’, which is about a realistic story of ‘Shim Eun-joo’ who quitted her job and changed her own life with DIY interior design that she likes. This webtoon is currently published in Line Webtoon.
The part one of Eun-joo’s Room is currently published as book and made as on-airing drama as well. The part one deals with a story about Shim Eun-joo’s changing her life with a hobby called DIY interior design while working as an editorial designer at the work and also about a changing relationship with Seo Min-seok who used to be her close friend since when they were children.
In Korea, many office workers are living as a slave of the workplace instead of actively leading the work, enough to be said that most of the office workers are holding the resignation letter inside of pocket every day. Specifically, the stress by people is worse than the stress by work itself enough to be said that most office workers are getting stressed by people, not by the work. In part one of Eun-joo’s room describes the situation of Shim Eun-joo, who also is struggling for such reasons. She’s been suffered from unfair business with a co-worker. And she keeps thinking and agonizing if this is the right reason for her graduated the university and if she’s living right. By doing so, she touches many viewers—office workers—hearts.
Then one day, Shim Eun-joo realized the condition of her studio apartment. She found the room became so messy just like her life because she couldn’t clean and organize the room due to nightworks, then she started the DIY interior design. By performing DIY interior design out of work stress, Shim Eun-joo changed her room and her life as well.
And the main story of part one of Eun-joo’s room is about young love story of Shim Eun-joo and ‘Seo Min-seok.’
The screenshot above is about the long one-sided love story of Seo Min-seok observed by ‘Shim Seung-joo’, the younger brother of Shim Eun-joo in part two and three. As Shim Eun-joo is dull in love, the love with Seo Min-seok is so young and fresh. Especially these two have known each other since elementary school, the process of changing relationship from friends to lovers is as fresh as watching a freshman in University. And I guess this is another selling point which makes people read this webtoon.
Part two and three of Eun-joo's Room deals with a story of Shim Eun-joo’s, who used to suffer from her workplace at part one, making some success in DIY interior design after quitting the editorial company and a story about her life after that.
In many fairytales, the story normally ends with “And then they lived happily ever after.” However, even in case when we define someone’s life as he/she lived happily, there must be some amount of bitterness in it when we look into it deeply. It only means the person lives a happy life in general, but there must be ups and downs in people’s life. Even though in the viewpoint of people, Shim Eun-joo’s life may seem successful when watching her speaking in the magazine interview, but when looking at it closely, we can see Shim Eun-joo confronting many realistic problems. And that’s the story what Eun-joo’s Room wants to describes.
Recognized by many people, Eun-joo performs on-site service also when someone asks for it. Listening to other people’s various life stories and doing the interior job for free, Shim Eun-joo uploads the pictures to the blog. By doing so, she feels a sense of accomplishment and lives in a happy mood as she’s doing the job that she likes.
But Eun-joo realized the limit of DIY interior design while fixing the house above. She realized it when she dropped the drill and broke the washstand and glass. It was not her fault, and she just tried to do over someone else’s shelf. Fortunately her boyfriend ‘Seo Min-seok’ solved the problem as he worked in interior design industry and studied the interior design professionally, but at this point Eun-joo realized the fact that she’s lack of ability and it became a chance for her to think about her DIY interior design job more seriously.
One of the most realistic problems that Eun-joo confronts in the Eunjoo-s Room is the problems that happen because of her parents and surroundings.
Even though there are many people who don’t care about other’s opinions at all, but how many people in Korea can truly live ignoring their surroundings including their own parents. As parents of Eun-joo in the webtoon are the people who typically have lived the period of economic growth, they represent current 60s and 70s in Korea. Therefore, it is normal for them to put pressure on Shim Eun-joo for her wedding, jobs, and children.
Recently various new jobs are appearing along with internet’s development. Among those jobs, there are jobs that we’ve never thought about it before the internet exists, such as blogger and BJ. In addition, even though we can categorize such jobs as blogger or BJ but the extent that such job includes is quite broad since they work in the fields in which they’re confident. However, unlike YouTubers, bloggers can’t make direct incomes if they are not outsourced since blogger can’t make enough money even if they put an ad on the blog. Therefore, it is inevitable to confront with a real problem to live by doing blog. For that, in the webtoon, Eun-joo earns money by doing outsourced editorial designing works to meet the economic needs while performing DIY interior design.
Of course, there are exceptions, but the generation of Shim Eun-joo’s parents mostly think such new jobs are unstable. Sure, they also understand and support her job later. But the story between these two scenes is similar to our reality and I guess that’s why this is a weird webtoon that makes people empathetic.
As Eun-joo’s Room is a story about DIY interior design, it’s another attraction that there are pictures of actual DIY interior designed places between episodes in line with one central story. I have no idea how does author find those places and upload such pictures, but since she shows scenes of construction and actual before/after pics, so if you’re a person who is interested in home interior design, you will enjoy those pictures.
And the story that ought not to be excluded in part two and three of Eun-joo’s Room is the developing relationship between Seo Min-seok and Shim Eun-joo. These two are not so intimate as shown in part one. It seems like it’s hard for them to be a passionate couple as they’ve been friends for a decade and more. In part two, the author describes the development of these two’s relationship, and we can watch their pure relationship with a big smile.
Weirdly Sympathetic Drama with Realistic Sense, ‘Eun-joo’s Room.’ There are many problems left to solve, I’m curious how the author will solve the problems and which new interior design will be conjugated with which story.
