its really SLOW!!!!!

oh boy, I now realize how little I know about databases...
OK, so I'm switching from MySQL to postgresql. I have
this database in MySQL which used the enum data type,
which looks to be a MySQL extension since there are no
enum data types in postgresql. What I do is store a bunch
of values of the setting of a magnet and I have about 6
entries per master record number. (i.e. I have a table
which I call the master table, one row entry per master record,
one table called the magnet table, which has many entries
per Master record entry.)
So what I do is loop over the master record entries, say
record numbers 5000-5300, and for each master record entry,
I look up in the magnet table data stored for that master
record. The deal is this, its really slow pulling out the
data from the magnet table. Like 15 seconds for 500 selects.
The equivalent select in MySQL ran at least 10 times faster.

Any ideas of what I'm doing wrong? Did I give you guys
enough information so that you understand what I'm doing?

Cheers. Steve.