Chaos In Korea

When my parents were growing up, they were under Japanese Occupation. In 1910, after years of unrest, Korea was annexed by Japan and remained under Japanese rule until 1945. My father received many special certificates with red stamps from the Japanese Principal for outstanding grades in school. My mother showed them to me many times over the years, and my sister still has them to this day... somewhere. During the Occupation, Koreans were not allowed to speak their own language; everything had to be in Japanese. They were punished if they ever spoke Korean, so they didn’t. They lost their Korean names, heritage, and any prestige that came with a last name. It was hard to keep records accurate as they were all in Japanese and subject to Japanese censorship. Over three decades of Korean history were erased and rewritten. I never asked my parents what their Korean names were, but I wish I had asked my mother while she was alive; it would have been interesting. 

 

After World War II, the fate of Korea was still dismal for the next five years. Who knows what condition our family faced by then? It was difficult for everyone in the country due to political instability. There was a major power struggle between Western Nations and the Communist bloc, which led to the Korean Civil War. My father married my mother when he was twenty-four, three years older than my mother. My parents lived with my paternal grandmother; she loved them because they were always loving and kind to her. Grandmother no longer had her husband; he died when he was around thirty-eight from some serious disease. I wish I knew for sure exactly what the illness was that killed him. Everything about my father that I know has come from a relative, my mother, or my father’s brothers, and I cherish every word they share with me because it is all I have.

 

I have heard about my father’s intellectual gifts from many family members over the years. My father was a math and a gymnastics teacher in middle school or high school. He also played the flute, which I just recently found out from my sister, an interesting coincidence since I played the flute as well. He ran his own milling business, milling wheat and rice. Many repeatedly told me that my father’s singing voice was beautiful, something my oldest son inherited, as did my younger sister. He was one of the best singers in the family and was a happy person who often whistled. I, too, whistled all my life! 

 

Before my birth, my father had brought a little boy home from the streets. He was about twelve or thirteen years old. He was an orphan, living alone on the streets, with nowhere to go. My father offered him a place to stay in our home with family, food, and shelter if he wanted to come in exchange for helping around the home. He was a good helper and helped watch over me because I had just been born. I learned that this boy carried me around everywhere with him. It was a special bonding time for me to have someone like an older brother around, someone who loved and cared for me, like his little baby sister. I am grateful to him for his love and care for me. It makes me proud to know my parents had kind enough hearts to take him in from the streets. I wish I knew where he was today so I could thank him.

 

My mother said she was sick for most of the nine months of pregnancy. She could not keep any food down. I was born a year after they were married, but rumblings of war were the whispers and fears of most Koreans. I was born Choi Geung Ok in Korea on December 27th, 1949. Six months later, or one year and six months later…depending on what Korean or Chinese calendar I went by…the Korean Civil War was officially declared on June 25th, 1950. Over seventy-five thousand soldiers from North Korea crossed the 38th parallel. It was the first military action of the Cold War, and by July, American Troops had entered the war on behalf of South Korea. So it was an exceptionally hard time; things were chaotic politically, career-wise, and in family life.