THE KENTUCKY KERNEL, Thursday, April
A FOREIGNER'S VIEW

When Spring Comes Back
The war in Vietnam makes me very
sad. First of all, it vividly reminds me
of the Korean war with its hopelessly
painful memories. More important, it is
a final witness to inherent human stupidity telling a sad truth that man is but
a child whose agony is in being unable
to find a proper playpen and a

baby-sitte- r.

'

I sincerely sympathize with the gallant U.S. efforts in Vietnam. As a man,
however, my sympathy goes deeper to
an unknown Vietnamese soldier who
to become
might, as I was, be
a human miscarraige.
I was a college freshman, literally
fresh, when the Korean War broke out.
An ambitious youth with a toucn of
divine folly, I believed wholeheartedly
that all that was necessary for me to
discover a great law comparable to the
Newton's was to see another apple fall.
The future looked very bright until one
day gunsmoke clouded my views and
finally smothered my soul.
ill-fat-

A

75Mile March

While the Reds were shelling Seoul
I crossed the Han River by boat, and
marched 75 miles to my home, leaving
all my belongings behind except a suitcase. My feet were sore with blisters,
and before they healed I heard the rumor
that the Reds were already on our heels.
Some of our wealthier villagers fled southward, women carrying babies on their
backs and clothings on their heads. I
remained at home. I had an aged father,
71, and a young sister, 15, and I couldn't
leave them alone to take care of the rice-paddies and a cow.
Meanwhile in a neighboring town
where I went to high school, police
called for an emergency meeting of students who were formerly associated with
Socialist Youth Group. Some two hundred gathered at the meeting were shot
to death, and eerie tension and uneasiness prevailed the country.
One evening I heard the sounds of
artilleries and machine guns, and awoke
next morning to find the Reds everywhere. The Red soldiers, some of them
hardly young, and some female officers,
came to our village regularly to collect
pumpkins, potatoes, and rice. Soon they
required us to attend the
"progress meeting" every other day. They
also briefed us with the world news.
They said many nasty things about the
U.S. "imperialists" and its "puppet"
Syngman Rhee. They told us that West
Germans rebelled against Konrad Adnauer
and peacefully united with East Germany, urging us to follow the German
example.
At first the Reds were friendly to us.
We, the bunch of hillbillies, did everything not to arouse their suspicion and
anger. But the profound gloom began
to spread over the villagewhen the Reds
took sons and husbands from the land
to join the Peoples' Voluntary Armies.
ed

Ants On The Hill

Just about everyday U.S. saber jets
zipped across the sky and bombed roads
and bridges. Then every night we plodded five miles to the site of a damaged
railroad bridge with shovels and sandbags tc repair it. We worked all night
and returned home at dawn. It was a
futile job; we were millions of ants trying to build an ant hill, only to find the
next day that a giant foot crushed it
all to pieces again.
We underwent two months of forced labor. We dug trenches, transported rice on our backs, repaired roads
and bridges. I had to "volunteer," at
the point of the gun, to the Peoples'
Army. I narrowly escaped from the final
trap to return home safely, but a number
of my friends died.
We did all these, supposedly, in the
name of liberty. We the ignorant farmers
didn't know what liberty was because
we had never had the chance to taste
it. Naturally, we wanted to have rice
rather than liberty. We wanted our sons
and husbands back. But civilized and
progressive communists wouldn't hear us.
They fed us with the stale saga of Lenin
and Marx, whose prophesy was sure to
bring the kingdom of God immediately.
But we knew neither Stalin nor Truman
was able to send rains from the sky at
went dry.
will when our
The fortunes of the war changed hands
and the UN forces made a triumphant
reentry. Of course we welcomed them
rice-paddi-

8,

19G5- -7

inn

... A Rendezvous With Death

with open arms, but were saddened when
they put more people to death for their
forced cooperations with the Reds.
I left the
billage trying to do something. Jobs were scare and employers
shunned young men. Fortunately, however, I found a job at Pusan, the first
job I had in my life. But what a supreme
irony of fate that I should start my public
career as an interpreter at a whorehouse!
Soon I found a delicate dilemna of
either joining the Army or going to jail.
I joined the U.S. Marine
Corps as the
lesser of the two evils.

More Meat In

A

Month

The life with the Marines was not
too bad. In fact I ate more meat in one
month with the marines than all that I
consumed during the 19 years of my
previous life. The march in general was
rather painful, especially when cold rain
drizzled all night. But we took it lightly
as the regular routine of our business.
I found that the battle wasn't
particularly exciting since I couldn't identify
which bullet killed whom. At each battle
we lost a few men and many were wounded. Within two months, hoever, I nourished a strange faith that a bullet would
never strike me even though it may hit
Joe or Bob. I suppose every soldier embraces this land of illusion until the facts
of life deny it with a sad example.
We set boobytraps, carried the wounded, patrolled in the snow. The fighting
was fun except that some G.I.'s missed
their girl friends a little and their convertibles a little more.
I, too, enjoyed the war moderately
until one day I went to the field hospital
because of my eye troubles. The Korean
Marines had just made a crucial attack
on enemy, and casualities were high.
The wounded were pouring in. On the
left of my cot in the ward was a Korean
Marine sergeant, who was forced to have
all his legs and arms amputated. I used
to carry food for him. Once I was about
to take his empty tray away, he asked
me abruptly.
lt
"Are you married?"
"No," I was rather embarrassed.
"Please do if you can help it!"
With these words he began to cry
aloud. Only two months before he went
home on leave. His parents urged him to
marry a girl whom he liked very, much.
With the fortune of the war still uncertain, he couldn't decide and so wanted
to wait a little longer before he made
any commitment.
t

Nothing But Pity

"Is there any fool who would marry

such a wretch like me? Heavens, no!
She loves me. No, she used to love me.
I Vnow she will ask me to get married
to her, but how can I? I can stand any-

thing but pity!"
When he calmed down a little he
asked me if he should commit suicide.
I didn't know what to say. I could have
said that he didn't lose his arms and
legs in vain but offered them at the
sacred altar of liberty. Instead, I replied,
"Might as well," and briskly walked
away.
On my right side was a second lieutenant of the North Korean Army who lost
his left eye. I served his meal, too. I asked
him if he wanted to stay in South Korea
and live a free life.
"No, I must go home.'
"But why?"
"I have an old mother waiting for
me at home. The world is wide and
houses many people. But she'll be the
only woman who will truly love a disabled man. That's why."
"Do you hate us?"
"No, do you?"

"I guess not."

. He cried when I left the hospital to
return to active duty.
When we were not fighting we had
a worse time. Despondence gripped our
sould and utter hopelessness made us
beastly. We drank beer by the dozen
everyday and played cards with knives
drawn. Some G.I.'s shot their own feet
We cursed Truand were
Rhee. Then we
man, Stalin, Syngman
wept. Sometimes military police smuggled
in prostitutes, and we lined up at the
door of the temple of sacred prostitution
with happy expectations.
I, too, wondered at times why Russians and Americans didn't choose the
Siberian plains or the Texas prairies for
their fencing emdses Instead of rugged
court-martiale-

d.

A

SISTER WEEPS FOR HER BROTHER
victims of a nameless war
had to carry. I didn't kill enough people
to be worshipped as a hero. Nor did I
steal enough to think of my retirement
plan! I was just a human miscarriage.
Having found no wench kind enough to
marry me, I chose to be exiled to Amer...

hills of Korea. I wondered why they were
so eager to grant us liberty we hadn't
asked for. "Oh Liberty! Liberty! how
many crimes were committed in thy
name!" I echoed the voice of Madame
Roland. It was no use, though. No angels
descended from heaven to save my poor
soul.
died in
Shortly after my bunker-mat- e
action, I left the Marines fearing that I
might suffer the same fate. Then I found
a new job under the august title of a
"diplomat" in an orphanage near the
Kimpo Airport. The diplomatic missions
I was assigned were to persuade American
soldiers in the the airport in such a way
that the orphanage be granted the privilege of removing the garbage from their
barracks.

Picking At Garbage
Garbage for what? Americans dumped
the leftovers from the mess hall into the
garbage cans. With them came empty beer
cans, decayed fruits, magazines, newspapers, and cardboard. These were sold
to the poor,- for they used flattened beer
cans as a roofing material and newspapers for wallpaper. We had some fifty
orphans, and badly needed money to
feed them.
But I found to my surprise that a
great deal of the bribing and political
lobbying were required before we could
have access to the garbage. Of course,
I didn't know a congressman.
Some two years later I was drafted
into the Korean Army. The life there
was very miserable. I was paid some
fifty cents a month. Although the quantity was adequate, the quality of food was
terrible. Day in day out, we ate hardly
anything but rice and beansprout soup.
Once every two weeks we were treated
with "meat soup," the turgid water
"through which wallowed a pig with
boots on," since we never found a chunk
of meat in it.
Cease-fir- e
having been in effect for
some time, civilians regarded soldiers
as glorious scoundrels. In fact, soldiers
were official bandits. We rode in the
bus without paying the fare. We ate
at the restaurant and beat the owner.
In a sense this was not our fault. In a
land of the size of Kentucky, 750,000
soldiers were pulsating like a cluster
of maggots on the corpse of a stinking cow. Furthermore, we had nothing
constructive to do now that the war is
over; On the evening of our pay day,
we pooled our money to buy the cheapest liquor. We wanted to get drunk so
badly in order to drown the hateful memory of existence. When we were drunk,
we always cried. Some smashed windows
and robbed shops. We had to survive;
we stole drugs, blankets, boots, and even
trucks to sell in order to answer the ardent
plea of our stomachs.
After eight years of "proud" service to my country, I was discharged with
When 1 came
the rank of
howled at me, mistaking
home, my dog
me for a stranger. Indeed, I was a stranger
People didn't need me any more. The fact
that I spent so many years in the army
was a yellow badge that a Korean Jew
staff-sergean-

t.

ica, the land of spinsters.

Not Totally In Vain
Friends tell me that eight years of
tribulations were not totally vain. I admit.
I amassed experiences
that is, I piled up
a brilliant record of failures. I learned how
to read and speak English. In my loneliness I flirted with philosophy and was
married to Spinoza, a tender mistress who
taught me the art of looking at things sub
specie aeternitatis under the aspect of
eternity. I grew very religious as to adopt
two gods instead of one Irony and Pity;
Irony to laugh off miseries and despairs,
and Pity to forgive and even love human
stupidity.
The man who is writing this elegy is
not the once ambitious youth. The youth
died in the battle field with all his
beautiful dreams. He never emerged from
the debris of war. What survived is his
ghost, roaming aimlessly over the eerie
sphere to find a Hamlet. With a college
degree behind, I am often tempted to forgive my past. I am even inclined to dramatize it. All these sufferings were just a
necessary prelude to my glorious exodus
from the mud hut to the Empire State
Building.
Often I feel like a Moses at the summit
of Mt. Nebo looking over the promised
land, although I am too weary and tired
to enter it myself. But alas, I don't have
my Joshua! It was worthwhile to have a
U.S. education denied to so many. It
was nice to have a nodding acquaintance
with electrons. But whenever I come to
myself, I cannot help feeling the deep
embarrassment of a letter ldelivered to
a wrong address.

Basic Question Remains

Still the basic question remains to be
answered. Why did I have to go through
these painful experiences and finally ruin,
my life? There is no why. It was just a
historical necessity. It was just a bad
luck, I suppose, that I was born in
Korea. Only thing I can say honestly
now is that I didn't fight against communism nor for liberty but for sheer
survival. Have I survived? The man died
long ago.

The news from Vietnam throws me
into deep melancholy. We argue whether
U.S. should make a definite stand there
or not. We speculate whether the Red
China will enter the war. But so little
has been discussed of the fates of Vietnamese soldiers lighting and dying without knowing why.
What is in the mind of an unknown
Vietnamese soldier? I can't say. At this
moment maybe he is thinking of Us
aged mother, pregnant wife, and hungry
children at home. Maybe he is crying,
as I did so often, singing:
have a rendezvous with Death
At some disputed barricade,
When spring comes back with rustling
shade
And apple blossoms fill the air

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