“Ah, Jenny-pah,” I heard as the recognizable outline of my hagwon’s director came toward me. His long-sleeve Oxford shirt opened wide its arms as his gait stretched to fill the distance between us, each an obvious gesture of relief.
It was nearly 11:30 PM on my last night in Korea and I had been waiting for almost an hour. I rested on the black granite sill of Ramada Hotel’s business sign, the end of Maya Angelou’s childhood saga in my hand. Minutes before, along with a few other stragglers clinging to the coffee shop patio next door, I had been asked to find another place to loiter—so there I was in the cool night air, lingering. And I still had to pack.
“There’s been a misunderstanding between us,” my director assured nervously, his smile full of wavering resolve. “I thought you called to my wife and she told you.”
“No, I gave away my phone today,” I replied. “My friend has it. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
By now my director’s hip rested on the same sill, half a meter from mine. From this perch he flopped, haphazardly but confidently, chirping the news. “I went to the tax office today,” he informed me brightly. “You will get your money within one week. Seven business days—so maybe next Tuesday.”
This from the man who quoted the fifteenth of June as my payday, only to have to back out of that promise days past due. This was the same man who stole from my check to pay his debts, and the man who thought it more convenient to lie to the government than be up-front about his business. The injustice of his actions was piling up in front of him. Having nursed a nagging sense of uneasy nausea all weekend, my stomach was still churning at his words.
“Don’t worry about the others,” he was saying now, referencing my co-workers. “You will get paid. You worked the best out of all of them.”
He already hadn’t paid an entire year’s worth of pension money, nor was he prepared to give me the foreigner’s severance package stipulated by Korean law. One poor fiscal choice after another had led to this—a closed school and teachers left to find work across the Pacific. But not only did the school have to suffer; now so did his family. What suddenly made his word his bond now?
Nothing in my heart wanted to ask a just and jealous God to bless the work of a man who would be so irresponsible. I bit my tongue as I said what came next. “Before we go, Mr. Chung, can I pray for you?”
He laughed off the question self-consciously, then consented. “You Christian? Cath-oh-lick? My wife,” he nodded proudly. “She Christian.” He gave me his hand as I bowed my head respectfully.
“Lord Jesus, we lift up Mr. Chung and his family,” I began. “We know that they are going through difficult circumstances—” Circumstances they brought on themselves, I wanted to scream— “but we ask that you would strengthen them. If they have to walk through these consequences, then give them endurance.”
As I prayed, I thought of those that had been caught in sin in the presence of Jesus: Instead of pounding them with religion, He kept showing mercy. I remembered His words to the adulterous woman. “Lord, Your Word says that You told people to go and sin no more.”
I didn’t want forgiveness—I wanted justice. I wanted him to deeply understand his crimes. You have an obligation to be righteous, I wanted to tell him. I wanted to bully him into doing right.
“And, Lord,” my mouth framed, nearly against my own will, “I ask that Mr. Chung would sin no more.”
I felt a little dubious as I finished, somewhat dishonest with my own intentions. My heart betrayed my own thoughts, even as my words had relayed the opposite. I certainly wasn’t worthy of any thanks offered to me.
As I crept up to December’s apartment one last time to finish preparations for the morning, I again cried out to God—this time, for myself. “Lord, I need Your heart for these,” I confessed. “Not my own.” I still harbored feelings of condemnation towards him, but what I needed most was a sense of the Lord’s divine mercy holding back the tide of just deserts.
Only the One without spot or blemish would be so worthy as to cast stones of judgment. If Mr. Chung had been culpable in anything, I was non the less. And yet He says to the guilty, “Then neither do I condemn you. So go, and sin no more.”
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Hesitation
The air quietly breathes its freshness into the room as I sit as a guest of my friend December's on a newly-made Moroccan rug. Ruthie, the small house dog, grunts and growls at me from her high place atop the bed where her owner is resting. December's phone tells me it's finally morning: June 21, 2011, by its end the longest Tuesday I'll have ever had. Homecoming Day.
In less than six hours I will be boarding a plane bound for Texas with my one-way ticket in hand, unsure of when the next flight will ferry me back to Asia. Yet, my suitcases remain glued to the floor as if they were impenetrable rock. In less than two years this part of the world, largely unknown to vast populations of the US, has burrowed itself deep in the ressesses of my heart in ways that I never expected, and I quite hesitate to say goodbye.
Here are a select few of those ways:
*I chanced to meet a woman at a thrift store who, despite obvious language barriers, became one of the dearest and closest friends of mine and accepted me with such deep, unconditional love.
*I've been encouraged and strengthened by the ex-pat Christian community through the ministries of Seoul International Baptist Church and its members.
*Through three schools located in two countries, I had the privelege of reaching out and ministering to four major ethnic groups within Asia: Russian, Indian, Thai, and Korean.
*I tried my hand--er, lips--at speaking in four previously foreign languages and successfully carried a tune in two of them.
*I witnessed North Korea's picturesque mountainy landscape and was able to meet a young man who has actually vacationed in that closed country.
*I have been able to earnestly beseech the heart of Father God for the hearts, souls, and lives of dear, dear friends that I have come to greatly cherish halfway around the world.
*I was unexpectedly able to join a girlfriend on her trip to Thailand and might have found the next step of the journey.
About two or three years ago--summer of 2009, if memory serves--I had a dream about two pictures posted on Facebook. One was a picture of dried fish and the other was a shot of bottles of beverages in a grocer's chest refrigerator. In the dream, a close friend of mine commented that there was "a better selection in the Asian markets here."
I was just commenting about her comment when I shot up in bed and marveled loudly, "I just had a dream that I was in Asia!" Within months of that statement, I was.
"I can't believe you're leaving," my friend Josh commented offhand this afternoon as I helped him edit his paper one last time. "We've talked about it and you have good reasons, but I still can't believe it."
Neither can I, Josh. Neither can I.
In less than six hours I will be boarding a plane bound for Texas with my one-way ticket in hand, unsure of when the next flight will ferry me back to Asia. Yet, my suitcases remain glued to the floor as if they were impenetrable rock. In less than two years this part of the world, largely unknown to vast populations of the US, has burrowed itself deep in the ressesses of my heart in ways that I never expected, and I quite hesitate to say goodbye.
Here are a select few of those ways:
*I chanced to meet a woman at a thrift store who, despite obvious language barriers, became one of the dearest and closest friends of mine and accepted me with such deep, unconditional love.
*I've been encouraged and strengthened by the ex-pat Christian community through the ministries of Seoul International Baptist Church and its members.
*Through three schools located in two countries, I had the privelege of reaching out and ministering to four major ethnic groups within Asia: Russian, Indian, Thai, and Korean.
*I tried my hand--er, lips--at speaking in four previously foreign languages and successfully carried a tune in two of them.
*I witnessed North Korea's picturesque mountainy landscape and was able to meet a young man who has actually vacationed in that closed country.
*I have been able to earnestly beseech the heart of Father God for the hearts, souls, and lives of dear, dear friends that I have come to greatly cherish halfway around the world.
*I was unexpectedly able to join a girlfriend on her trip to Thailand and might have found the next step of the journey.
About two or three years ago--summer of 2009, if memory serves--I had a dream about two pictures posted on Facebook. One was a picture of dried fish and the other was a shot of bottles of beverages in a grocer's chest refrigerator. In the dream, a close friend of mine commented that there was "a better selection in the Asian markets here."
I was just commenting about her comment when I shot up in bed and marveled loudly, "I just had a dream that I was in Asia!" Within months of that statement, I was.
"I can't believe you're leaving," my friend Josh commented offhand this afternoon as I helped him edit his paper one last time. "We've talked about it and you have good reasons, but I still can't believe it."
Neither can I, Josh. Neither can I.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Terrorist Tourism: Underlined
*May 29, 2011*
After Freedom Bridge, the DMZ tour group headed to another famous marker within the Demilitarized Zone: Tunnel Number Three. This tunnel, no bigger than a crawlspace directly underneath the Line of Demarcation, was found in the early 1970s through a North Korean defector. Later, larger tunnels were also found for a total of four currently known to be in existence. In each of them, coal dust was liberally smeared on the walls to disguise them as abandoned coal mines, though none such mines previously had existed in this part of Korea.
These tunnels were allegedly hewn by the North Korean military to provide access to the south for foot soldiers, giving a thousand men the ability to reach Seoul within an hour. The North staunchly denies any involvement and instead suggests foul play by the South, but the chisel strikes to dig out the rock indicate that the tunnel’s workers must have been facing southward.
Our bus pulled up to another parking lot like the one from our previous stop, only it was a quarter the size and minus misplaced carnival rides. Round, dark buildings intimately surrounded the car park on three sides, nearly hemming in visitors. A thick forest stood at attention to the left of the scene.
In front of the cars was perched a tall “DMZ” monogram, nearly innocuous in its friendly pastels. To the right of the initials rested a sculpture of the world divided in half, with a circle of chiseled humanity holding up each side. The building just in front of the bus housed an indoor educational theater and a small museum. To the right of that lay a platform for carting older guests mine-car style into the tunnel.
A signed gleamed in the mid-morning sun, prompting us forward. “DMZ Pavilion,” an arrow pointed to the left. The rest of the message sat mute in hanguel letters, with no other English accompanying it to unlock its tongue. The tour group, armed with its limited information, shuffled inside.
In the Pavilion, designed like an amply accomodating home theater with tiered captain's chairs and a wall-sized panoramic screen, we listened to a voiced-over seven-minute explanation of the existence of the DMZ. The narrator listed the end of World War II and the subsequent Korean War as the primary cause of Korea's tense buffer zone.
Announcer-like, we heard the man proclaim at the end that even through the tragedy of war, the land was still teeming with natural life. Supported by a grand trumpet, his deep voice rang out, “The DMZ is alive!” Moments later, the floor-to-ceiling screen in front of us parted like the Red Sea and we walked through it to a museum adjacent the theater.
Fascinated, I tried reading every snippet of facts the displays had to offer: Here was documentation about the defector who triggered the search for one tunnel--here, how they suspected the second. Lost in the dusty details of the past, I failed to note when my large, largely white tour group had exited the room and left me alone with a swarm of Chinese tourists.
“I'll be in the tunnel if you have any questions,” the tour guide had said. From everything I had read in the museum, I was expecting little more than a hole in the ground, much like the shaft used to discover caves at Natural Bridge Caverns in Texas. What I met with, however, was a whole lot of concrete.
Across the from the DMZ Pavilion crouched what loked like a quiet amphatheater juxtaposed next to empty railroad track which led into a pitch-black cavern. “Don't go up there,” I remember my tour guide chiding. “We have legs. We can walk.” Yet I still didn't know what it was I was walking to.
If hindsight is twenty-twenty, it doesn't help you until you actually look back--which, that day, was the one direction I never tried. Instead, I followed the path from the rail line along the other side of the parking lot towards the bathrooms and a little park next to a large building. Spying a pathway, I walked further into the greenery and around the structure.
Inside the park, I discovered a stretch of fence not ten yards long, directly in the middle of the grass. It stood to one side of a small concrete ditch which bisected the peaceful scene. A tiny red triangle with letters in both languages fiercely guarded its chain links.
“Oh, it's a mine!” I exclaimed breathlessly as I got close enough to read the letters. To its right, a companion fence with the same little red triangle screamed its warming as it ran out into the dense vegetation. It was definitely time to find that tunnel!
I stumbled into the back entrance to what at first appeared to be a gift shop. Shifting my gaze the right I noticed the beginning of a ramp spiralling downward and a shelf full of yellow hardhats. This looked easier than being lowered into a shaft at Natural Bridge; grabbing a hardhat, I ventured inside.
“It's going to take ten minutes to get down there,” December warned as she came back up, her words tinged with wise realism. As I checked my watch again, I knew she was right. I had spent too much time babysitting mines and empty railway shafts to have any more to devote to Tunnel Number three. Plus, I didn't know how I would heave myself 100 or more meters back up the ramp. Reluctantly, I returned my barely-warm hardhat to itself and headed back outside.
Just before we boarded the bus again, I glanced back at the world split in half. Pleasantly, Korean after Korean stood on both of its sides bracing for a picture, their hands on whichever half they chose. I couldn't help but notice that their presence mimicked the bronze statues which continue to people the sculpture long after the last flesh-and-blood tourist has gone home. They really were holding up the world, I thought, pushing it together with each caress of its smooth surface.
After Freedom Bridge, the DMZ tour group headed to another famous marker within the Demilitarized Zone: Tunnel Number Three. This tunnel, no bigger than a crawlspace directly underneath the Line of Demarcation, was found in the early 1970s through a North Korean defector. Later, larger tunnels were also found for a total of four currently known to be in existence. In each of them, coal dust was liberally smeared on the walls to disguise them as abandoned coal mines, though none such mines previously had existed in this part of Korea.
These tunnels were allegedly hewn by the North Korean military to provide access to the south for foot soldiers, giving a thousand men the ability to reach Seoul within an hour. The North staunchly denies any involvement and instead suggests foul play by the South, but the chisel strikes to dig out the rock indicate that the tunnel’s workers must have been facing southward.
Our bus pulled up to another parking lot like the one from our previous stop, only it was a quarter the size and minus misplaced carnival rides. Round, dark buildings intimately surrounded the car park on three sides, nearly hemming in visitors. A thick forest stood at attention to the left of the scene.
In front of the cars was perched a tall “DMZ” monogram, nearly innocuous in its friendly pastels. To the right of the initials rested a sculpture of the world divided in half, with a circle of chiseled humanity holding up each side. The building just in front of the bus housed an indoor educational theater and a small museum. To the right of that lay a platform for carting older guests mine-car style into the tunnel.
A signed gleamed in the mid-morning sun, prompting us forward. “DMZ Pavilion,” an arrow pointed to the left. The rest of the message sat mute in hanguel letters, with no other English accompanying it to unlock its tongue. The tour group, armed with its limited information, shuffled inside.
In the Pavilion, designed like an amply accomodating home theater with tiered captain's chairs and a wall-sized panoramic screen, we listened to a voiced-over seven-minute explanation of the existence of the DMZ. The narrator listed the end of World War II and the subsequent Korean War as the primary cause of Korea's tense buffer zone.
Announcer-like, we heard the man proclaim at the end that even through the tragedy of war, the land was still teeming with natural life. Supported by a grand trumpet, his deep voice rang out, “The DMZ is alive!” Moments later, the floor-to-ceiling screen in front of us parted like the Red Sea and we walked through it to a museum adjacent the theater.
Fascinated, I tried reading every snippet of facts the displays had to offer: Here was documentation about the defector who triggered the search for one tunnel--here, how they suspected the second. Lost in the dusty details of the past, I failed to note when my large, largely white tour group had exited the room and left me alone with a swarm of Chinese tourists.
“I'll be in the tunnel if you have any questions,” the tour guide had said. From everything I had read in the museum, I was expecting little more than a hole in the ground, much like the shaft used to discover caves at Natural Bridge Caverns in Texas. What I met with, however, was a whole lot of concrete.
Across the from the DMZ Pavilion crouched what loked like a quiet amphatheater juxtaposed next to empty railroad track which led into a pitch-black cavern. “Don't go up there,” I remember my tour guide chiding. “We have legs. We can walk.” Yet I still didn't know what it was I was walking to.
If hindsight is twenty-twenty, it doesn't help you until you actually look back--which, that day, was the one direction I never tried. Instead, I followed the path from the rail line along the other side of the parking lot towards the bathrooms and a little park next to a large building. Spying a pathway, I walked further into the greenery and around the structure.
Inside the park, I discovered a stretch of fence not ten yards long, directly in the middle of the grass. It stood to one side of a small concrete ditch which bisected the peaceful scene. A tiny red triangle with letters in both languages fiercely guarded its chain links.
“Oh, it's a mine!” I exclaimed breathlessly as I got close enough to read the letters. To its right, a companion fence with the same little red triangle screamed its warming as it ran out into the dense vegetation. It was definitely time to find that tunnel!
I stumbled into the back entrance to what at first appeared to be a gift shop. Shifting my gaze the right I noticed the beginning of a ramp spiralling downward and a shelf full of yellow hardhats. This looked easier than being lowered into a shaft at Natural Bridge; grabbing a hardhat, I ventured inside.
“It's going to take ten minutes to get down there,” December warned as she came back up, her words tinged with wise realism. As I checked my watch again, I knew she was right. I had spent too much time babysitting mines and empty railway shafts to have any more to devote to Tunnel Number three. Plus, I didn't know how I would heave myself 100 or more meters back up the ramp. Reluctantly, I returned my barely-warm hardhat to itself and headed back outside.
Just before we boarded the bus again, I glanced back at the world split in half. Pleasantly, Korean after Korean stood on both of its sides bracing for a picture, their hands on whichever half they chose. I couldn't help but notice that their presence mimicked the bronze statues which continue to people the sculpture long after the last flesh-and-blood tourist has gone home. They really were holding up the world, I thought, pushing it together with each caress of its smooth surface.
My New Favorite Song
I stared at the lines and squiggly curls in front of me that shone brightly on the wall, their message unwilling to be unlocked. My brain was hard pressed to wrap around the idea that the strange markings represented actual words, let alone the sounds that gave them voice. Below them lay a recognizable alphabet that I could at least identify, if not fully understand.
We had been trading languages all night as a part of Peace Fellowship's worship service that Friday night in Thailand, swapping a song in English for one like this, in indecipherable Thai. Shrugging away an absent English translation, I took a deep breath. I sang, instantly hooked on a catchy tune that was sometimes staccato-fast, and at times more slowly melodic. It mattered less that I could understand what I was singing and more that I knew I was singing whatever it was about and to Jesus. And that I was surrounded by people who were doing nothing but the same.
"It's a simple song," my Thai friend Pi-Rung commented the night I left. It just tells the congregation to come and worship its King.
Hallelujah, praise His Name.
Present a new song.
All the kings unto the LORD
singing hallelujah.
Padre Nuestro
"I have something for you," he said slowly. "But it's in Spanish. It's from Matthew chapter six verse nine."
The thought of the gift itself already caught me off guard, but knowing that it was in such a completely foreign language--in Thailand--surprised me all the more. Amid the rustle of student activity, he slipped off a wide silver band and handed it to me. I fingered the engraving while it was still warm and then, quietly in the middle of class, I began to read.
"Padre nuestro que estás en el cielo," I started, "santificado sea Tu nombre." Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.
From beside me, he declared simply, "Amen." Perhaps his class would have to wait.
"Venga a nosotoros Tu reino," I continued. "Hagase Tu voluntad en la tierra como en el cielo. Danos hoy nuestro pan de cada dia. Perdona nuestros ofendas como tambien nosotros perdamos a los que nos ofenden. No nos dejes caer en la tentación, y liberarnos del mal. Amen."
Thy kingdom come, it reads in English. Thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
He looked at me when I had finished. "Jesus didn't teach His disciples how to heal the sick or do miracles or feed five thousand people," he explained. "He taught them how to pray."
So now he was teaching me.
The thought of the gift itself already caught me off guard, but knowing that it was in such a completely foreign language--in Thailand--surprised me all the more. Amid the rustle of student activity, he slipped off a wide silver band and handed it to me. I fingered the engraving while it was still warm and then, quietly in the middle of class, I began to read.
"Padre nuestro que estás en el cielo," I started, "santificado sea Tu nombre." Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.
From beside me, he declared simply, "Amen." Perhaps his class would have to wait.
"Venga a nosotoros Tu reino," I continued. "Hagase Tu voluntad en la tierra como en el cielo. Danos hoy nuestro pan de cada dia. Perdona nuestros ofendas como tambien nosotros perdamos a los que nos ofenden. No nos dejes caer en la tentación, y liberarnos del mal. Amen."
Thy kingdom come, it reads in English. Thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.
He looked at me when I had finished. "Jesus didn't teach His disciples how to heal the sick or do miracles or feed five thousand people," he explained. "He taught them how to pray."
So now he was teaching me.
Friday, June 10, 2011
Thai Peace
Sawatnika! That's Thai for hello. I'm currently sitting at an Internet cafe in downtown Bangkok--and it's been a wonderful trip so far. I've seen God provide for my every need and go above and beyond what I envisioned. It says so in Scripture that He provides that way and it is so moving to see it lived out.
I have come to hot, sticky Thailand to check out a ministry opportunity with a friend and help out with it as much as I can. It's an English school called Santisuk that's run just like a church: They teach Scripture and Bible stories using English as the medium. The workers there have taken me in and given me and my friend a place to stay. Holly and I have just been blown away by their acceptance of us, no questions asked.
I have been nothing but encouraged since landing. The woman who picked me up at 2 in the morning Tuesday night prayed that my delayed flight would not be canceled and, two hours after it was scheduled to land, we taxied to the arrival gate. The next day, I waited among other Christian Thai in the still night air for a powerful Hillsong United concert that almost never was. The very next day, I was able to pray over a host of little children gathered quietly at my feet and tell them the story of Samuel annointing King David, symbolically annointing them for the work God has chosen.
I know this trip is from the LORD and I am so richly blessed to be here. I have a new friend named Kong who says I should come back and volunteer. He says that the country has a lot to offer and that, if I were interested, I might be able to come and teach at an international school here as well.
"Thailand," he whispers to me as we walk along the road or sit in his classroom. "Thailand."
I have come to hot, sticky Thailand to check out a ministry opportunity with a friend and help out with it as much as I can. It's an English school called Santisuk that's run just like a church: They teach Scripture and Bible stories using English as the medium. The workers there have taken me in and given me and my friend a place to stay. Holly and I have just been blown away by their acceptance of us, no questions asked.
I have been nothing but encouraged since landing. The woman who picked me up at 2 in the morning Tuesday night prayed that my delayed flight would not be canceled and, two hours after it was scheduled to land, we taxied to the arrival gate. The next day, I waited among other Christian Thai in the still night air for a powerful Hillsong United concert that almost never was. The very next day, I was able to pray over a host of little children gathered quietly at my feet and tell them the story of Samuel annointing King David, symbolically annointing them for the work God has chosen.
I know this trip is from the LORD and I am so richly blessed to be here. I have a new friend named Kong who says I should come back and volunteer. He says that the country has a lot to offer and that, if I were interested, I might be able to come and teach at an international school here as well.
"Thailand," he whispers to me as we walk along the road or sit in his classroom. "Thailand."
Terrorist Tourism: Freedom
*May 29, 2011*
The busload of foreigners pulled up into the vast empty parking lot, a six-foot marker reading “Imjingak” in white Roman script looming in front of it at the entrance. Less than a hundred yards to the right of the sign hung a traditional Korean victory bell in a large white gazebo, which was meant for wishing good health and harmony. Far off the lot to the left stood a small sleepy carnival, all but deserted so early on a Sunday morning.
The tour guide at the front of the bus held a portable mic in his hands. “I don’t know what the theme park’s about,” he was saying to his guests. “It’s supposed to be a memorial.” Through the crowd’s nervous laughter, he relayed the time for the tour group to be back on the bus. They’d have fifty minutes to explore the grounds—just be back by 9:30 sharp.
We had thus arrived at the first stop on our tour of the DMZ: Freedom Bridge, where North and South Korea had exchanged prisoners throughout the Korean War. In disuse due to the frail, half-century stalemate, it had been appropriated by the southern government as a place of remembrance and a monument of peace. “Are you ready for a bridge adventure?” my seatmate asked.
The first thing I stumbled upon as I mounted the two flights of stairs astride the victory bell pavilion was a large display case full of rocks. There were dozens and dozens of them “collected from 86 battlefields in 64 different countries,”—silent witness to the violent atrocities man had committed against his fellow man. “It is my sincere wish that the bringing together of these stones… will be a stepping stone for the reunification of the Korean people,” the message said, “and mark the beginning of a century of peace and harmony for all mankind.”
Just beyond the rock display and over a lip of concrete lay a pleasant row of trees with a posted warning not to photograph what lay beyond. The bare ground beneath the sign spoke a silent testament to the many feet that had belayed the order. In the distance one could see a long white bridge across the Imjingak River towards the left, severed from further connection only by a thin border of chain-linked fence.
North Korea.
I ventured to the left of the scene towards the white bridge in the distance. Another fence blocked off this part of the exhibit as well, this time covered in mourners’ ribbons. “Although I am not part of the generation who has lost,” read a fresh white ribbon in English, “I feel the enormous pain of those after coming here. I wish for unification of not just the countries but of families, friends, and lovers. 2011 SUMMER Julia Joo.” I couldn’t help but agree with her, this anonymous Julia: I hadn’t lived through the war, either, yet I felt Korea’s wound still throbbing.
On the opposite side of the ribbons stood a closed ticket counter. According to the signs it was purported to be part of a certain Gyeongui railway system, apparently a company no longer servicing rides. I couldn’t understand the juxtaposition of an empty railroad booth together with memorial ribbons—that is, until I saw the train.
Ten yards in front of the booth, an ancient locomotive rested on stunted rail line as though it were in a coffin. Above it, a wooden bridge crossed the scene respectfully like those walking along the backside of headstones. Rust covered the corpse like an orange-red burial shroud. Bullet holes riddled its sides like a scream choked at the throat just before death. Mitzubishi’s broken triangle tattooed its still flank, a testament to its once glorious youth.
North Koreans had gunned down the engine on its last run, the plaque read. And now it stood as a somber reminder of the North’s still-threatening potential for violence. A casualty of an antique war.
On the opposite side of the railway ticket booth from the memorial ribbons stood the famed Freedom Bridge, built in 2000 according to its dedication plaque for “breaking the fifty-year barrier.” It straddled a serene park fifty yards below, and pointed towards yet another string of fence. Above the jagged barbed wire curling anxiously over the top of the scene at the bridge’s end flew three flags: two for Korea and one a calming baby blue. Covered in ribbons like flower bouquets on a casket, the fence blocked off the place of exchange for the two warring brothers.
Far below in the memorial park ran a pathway along the sides of two ponds, one a deep green covered in rich vegetation and the other crystal-blue and ever-churning with a short geyser in its midst. To the left of the geyser rose a pale thin sculpture of two bent sheaves of granite loosely tied together with a dark gray granite cord. “We are the one,” its sign admitted painfully. Tears misted my eyes like a shroud of mourning as I drank in the symbolism. Yes, you are, I noted inside my head. The other just doesn’t seem to see it that way.
I looked around for my seatmate after quietly leaving the memorial, only to find him waiting to board the bus with the last stragglers just as the minute hand struck thirty. “Just in time,” he winked at me, “with the first souvenirs of the day.”
The busload of foreigners pulled up into the vast empty parking lot, a six-foot marker reading “Imjingak” in white Roman script looming in front of it at the entrance. Less than a hundred yards to the right of the sign hung a traditional Korean victory bell in a large white gazebo, which was meant for wishing good health and harmony. Far off the lot to the left stood a small sleepy carnival, all but deserted so early on a Sunday morning.
The tour guide at the front of the bus held a portable mic in his hands. “I don’t know what the theme park’s about,” he was saying to his guests. “It’s supposed to be a memorial.” Through the crowd’s nervous laughter, he relayed the time for the tour group to be back on the bus. They’d have fifty minutes to explore the grounds—just be back by 9:30 sharp.
We had thus arrived at the first stop on our tour of the DMZ: Freedom Bridge, where North and South Korea had exchanged prisoners throughout the Korean War. In disuse due to the frail, half-century stalemate, it had been appropriated by the southern government as a place of remembrance and a monument of peace. “Are you ready for a bridge adventure?” my seatmate asked.
The first thing I stumbled upon as I mounted the two flights of stairs astride the victory bell pavilion was a large display case full of rocks. There were dozens and dozens of them “collected from 86 battlefields in 64 different countries,”—silent witness to the violent atrocities man had committed against his fellow man. “It is my sincere wish that the bringing together of these stones… will be a stepping stone for the reunification of the Korean people,” the message said, “and mark the beginning of a century of peace and harmony for all mankind.”
Just beyond the rock display and over a lip of concrete lay a pleasant row of trees with a posted warning not to photograph what lay beyond. The bare ground beneath the sign spoke a silent testament to the many feet that had belayed the order. In the distance one could see a long white bridge across the Imjingak River towards the left, severed from further connection only by a thin border of chain-linked fence.
North Korea.
I ventured to the left of the scene towards the white bridge in the distance. Another fence blocked off this part of the exhibit as well, this time covered in mourners’ ribbons. “Although I am not part of the generation who has lost,” read a fresh white ribbon in English, “I feel the enormous pain of those after coming here. I wish for unification of not just the countries but of families, friends, and lovers. 2011 SUMMER Julia Joo.” I couldn’t help but agree with her, this anonymous Julia: I hadn’t lived through the war, either, yet I felt Korea’s wound still throbbing.
On the opposite side of the ribbons stood a closed ticket counter. According to the signs it was purported to be part of a certain Gyeongui railway system, apparently a company no longer servicing rides. I couldn’t understand the juxtaposition of an empty railroad booth together with memorial ribbons—that is, until I saw the train.
Ten yards in front of the booth, an ancient locomotive rested on stunted rail line as though it were in a coffin. Above it, a wooden bridge crossed the scene respectfully like those walking along the backside of headstones. Rust covered the corpse like an orange-red burial shroud. Bullet holes riddled its sides like a scream choked at the throat just before death. Mitzubishi’s broken triangle tattooed its still flank, a testament to its once glorious youth.
North Koreans had gunned down the engine on its last run, the plaque read. And now it stood as a somber reminder of the North’s still-threatening potential for violence. A casualty of an antique war.
On the opposite side of the railway ticket booth from the memorial ribbons stood the famed Freedom Bridge, built in 2000 according to its dedication plaque for “breaking the fifty-year barrier.” It straddled a serene park fifty yards below, and pointed towards yet another string of fence. Above the jagged barbed wire curling anxiously over the top of the scene at the bridge’s end flew three flags: two for Korea and one a calming baby blue. Covered in ribbons like flower bouquets on a casket, the fence blocked off the place of exchange for the two warring brothers.
Far below in the memorial park ran a pathway along the sides of two ponds, one a deep green covered in rich vegetation and the other crystal-blue and ever-churning with a short geyser in its midst. To the left of the geyser rose a pale thin sculpture of two bent sheaves of granite loosely tied together with a dark gray granite cord. “We are the one,” its sign admitted painfully. Tears misted my eyes like a shroud of mourning as I drank in the symbolism. Yes, you are, I noted inside my head. The other just doesn’t seem to see it that way.
I looked around for my seatmate after quietly leaving the memorial, only to find him waiting to board the bus with the last stragglers just as the minute hand struck thirty. “Just in time,” he winked at me, “with the first souvenirs of the day.”
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Casanova
The last Sunday in May, December and I rounded the corner behind the thirty or so other waegukin-dul jockeying for position. We had signed up with William Cho and the Adventure Korea meet-up group for an all-day excursion to the DMZ. In front of us stood a long charter bus commissioned to ferry the large ensemble across Korea’s hotly contested terrain to its destination of choice, mere inches from the North Korean border.
Hoping to sit together, my friend and I soon realized that with all the people going there would likely be no dual seats left when we boarded the bus. Wonder of wonders, however, just four rows back from the driver sat a pair of seats yawning at each other across the aisle. December took the one to the left of her—which meant that I was left with the right.
The man filling the window space next to the empty seat could have easily been more than twice my size. I noticed his beefy thigh spilling over into the emptiness—and still he seemed cramped. To say that he was stocky would have quite underestimated his stature. “Excuse me,” I asked the stranger. I didn’t want to be rude and request him to move his leg. “Can I sit here?”
He looked up from the device plugged into his ears and visibly softened when he saw me. His eyes twinkled with unspoken excitement. “Yes, of course,” he agreed all too pleasantly, squeezing over half a centimeter.
There was no place for his leg to go and clearly no more room for my own. Reluctantly, I set my purple backpack down between the seats and slid in next to him, thigh-to-thigh. Pulling out my book, I opened Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings and tried to settle into the uncomfortably close hour-long bus ride.
Just across the Hangang heading northward out of Seoul, my seatmate interrupted me; it would be an intrusion to last the rest of the trip. “I’ve met her,” he said, nodding to the book. “Maya Angelou. She’s incredible. I read that book when I was in high school.”
“Did you like it?”
He shook his head.
“It’s more of a girlish book,” I nodded. “It talks about her being eight.” I had just finished the heart-wrenching piece of the story where she and her older brother are transported back to Stamps, Alabama, after a man’s choice had forced her to grow beyond her years. It was clearly dealing with feminine issues over masculine, I could see—so I sympathized with why he hadn’t been interested.
“I’m Calhoun, by the way,” he offered.
“Jennifer. Nice to meet you.” After we shook hands, he put away his music device and I put away my book, an unspoken bond of friendship now quietly linking us together. And once any relationship gets started, without dire consequence it’s impossible to simply walk away.
It wasn’t too long after initial introductions that my sitting companion started in on a particular subject that he never left off for the remainder of the trip. He began slowly, almost sympathetic at first, like a caged animal whimpering for help. But I soon discovered that he waited only to see if I would take his bait.
“Girls have it much easier than guys here in Korea,” he started to say. I tried asking for his reasons for such a quick assumption. He said that if they didn’t want a relationship or just wanted to party, then they were free to do just that. I hadn’t yet told him I wasn’t like most girls.
“Girls in Korea don’t want a relationship,” he affirmed pessimistically. “Most of them are only gonna be here for a year. Guys are left with turning to Korean girls.”
As Korean girls were notoriously skinny, I asked him what he thought of their general body shape—in hindsight, a particularly bad move. “I don’t want an anorexic stick,” he confessed. “You—” he looked me up and down, noticing the plump curve of my calf muscle. “Your size is perfect.” It was my first of many inklings—and outright blatant statements—of Casanova’s true thoughts about me.
As we debussed for our first stop of the day, Imjingak and the Freedom Bridge, we had to turn in our passports to the tour guides for verification and inspection. In line to do so, my companion mentioned behind me that he wasn’t very proud of his picture—but I assured him that mine was worse. Taken nine years and nearly thirty pounds ago, it stood in stark contrast to the much slimmer woman in possession of it now. As soon as we boarded again and were handed back our ID, I surrendered my right to be in the ROK for the second time that day just to show him.
It wasn’t my best move. He studied the information page a moment and then looked at me. “All I can say is,” he smiled slyly, “now hot…” His gaze trickled back to the open document in his hands and his face leaned toward me. “Then hot.”
With everyone now on the bus, the engine revved itself in preparation for another long drive, this time one hour and a half away to a string of restaurants along the Line of Demarcation. It was during this particular stretch that my companion’s topic abruptly intensified. Glancing out the window absently, his thoughts returned to the problem men faced. “That’s why they worry about the gender imbalance in China,” he was saying. “If women can’t fill guys’ needs, there are problems.”
I looked away from him a moment then smiled demurely. “I wouldn’t know anything about that,” I admitted softly.
He would have spit out water through his nose in his astonishment had he been drinking any. “Don’t tell me you’re—”
I cut him off with my unbroken gaze. “Squeaky clean.”
“Really?” he asked, still incredulous. “You know, I think three things about that.”
Okay, Casanova, batter up.
“I consider that a challenge.” His first swing.
“I think you’re really missing out on something.” Strike two.
And a little under his breath he hastily chopped at the third: “And I can’t wait to show you.” Strike three. Yyyyyou’rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrre out! If he had really wanted to get to first base, the man was surely going about it the wrong way.
Since when had my choice to save myself been an open invitation for him to take that gift from me? It was like having your greedy cousin over Christmas Morning, shaking the presents: What was left whole underneath the tree would surely be in pieces after his touch.
For my benefit, after my intimate confession my seatmate proceeded to build an argument for why promiscuity was not only the best choice for me at this point, but actually would lead to a more fulfilling marriage. “Society frowns on going after all these other guys,” he warned. “But there’s nothing wrong with being… with the one you love.” He then went on to suggest that my “experience” outside of marriage would do nothing but keep my husband satisfied because then I would understand our own compatibility.
Along with this argument, he voiced a staunch critique of the church for preaching a “suppressive free will” doctrine not actually found in the Bible. The Good Book, he said, talks about the freedom of choice—and because of this, I should be free from what others tell me I should do.
Again my steady gaze met his. “Is it all right if this is what I’ve chosen to do?” I asked him sternly. Is it okay if I actually agree with the will of God for my life?
“No, there’s nothing wrong with it,” he whimpered defensively. He just didn’t want me walking into marriage with any disadvantage, he said. If somehow my spouse and I weren’t compatible, finding out at the altar would then be too late.
“You’ll never guess what I was talking about on the ride over here,” I told December as soon as we had disembarked and started for the nearest empty restaurant. I then recounted the last hour’s sultry details as we dined on bulgoggi surrounded by a crowd of chairs and the stares of DMZ locals.
“Jennifer!” she chided in mock rebuke. “I was over there having intelligent conversation—what were you doing?” As I began filling her in on more of the story, however, her face fell. “Jenn, do you want me to switch seats? I can ask Hatish—”
I stopped her, equally as uncomfortable with the message that would send as I was with the topic of discussion. I couldn’t just dislodge myself from the web of human connection so recently spun. My hope was to wait out the day and see if he made any more passes.
The two of us chatted amiably for the rest of dinner until it was time to head back to the bus—and to our respective seats a chasm apart. “I’m sorry you got stuck with the creep,” December told me in sympathy. “I actually like my seat partner. He’s so nice.”
Sometime after lunch I raked up the courage to tell my seatmate how I really felt. “I’m not the right girl,” I confessed.
Playfully, sensually, he threw me a knowing look. “You might be,” he raised his eyebrows.
But I was adamant, unwilling for him to entertain even the slightest thought. “No, I’m not the right girl,” I repeated—this time with mild success. He made no more remarks about trying to make me his woman.
The rest of the trip was largely uneventful. That is, until the part I dreaded most: nearly the end. As he readied his things to take his leave of the bus at the first stop on our way back into Seoul, he again offered me his hand. “It’s been a pleasure meeting you, Jennifer,” he pronounced as sweet as a gentleman, rather in contrast to what came next.
His words slid like slick oil from his mouth. “You made the trip very enjoyable. I’m sure your dad would agree—” There he was again, leaning his head so far down and uncomfortably too close as he finished his sentence— “beautiful women make everything better.” As he said it, I couldn’t help but feeling like his personal eye candy. No wonder an already-cramped big man like him wouldn’t mind giving up the precious space beside him to a slender girl like me.
“Is it okay if I find you on Facebook?” he asked—this generation’s version of adding me to his Little Black Book. I told him it was, if only to squirm out of saying no. But the more I thought about it, the more I had serious doubts about accepting his request.
Monday morning as I sat in my quiet apartment, I was reading through the book of Jude. In it, the apostle warns of “certain men… who turn the grace of God into lewdness” (1:4). These, the writer asserts, follow their hearts’ desires by “mouth[ing] great swelling words [and] flattering people to gain advantage” (1:16). Hmm. Casanova to a T. “Sever yourselves from such a man,” Isaiah admonishes (2:22). “For of what account is he?” Though not expressly stated, surely that type of finality would include even frivolous connections like Facebook.
For about a day after receiving it, I let his request simmer along with the other new requests in the virtual pocket that the most popular social network had created for that purpose. Then Tuesday morning, just as quietly as the offer was made, I reached up my omnipotent cursor to the second button on the right—the gray one instead of its pleasant companion dressed in Facebook blue—and swiftly clicked “Ignore.”
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