3

A Stranger’s Visit

 

 

 

Where we lived, the temperature rose and fell with the wind. Fall was slipping into winter; leaves were falling from the trees, which themselves were becoming shorter and skinnier as the ground grew softer and taller. Piles of leaves meant that it was time to prepare for winter. The cold pinched at our flesh; sometimes the snow was as deep as I was tall. No matter how cold it got, however, I still pressed for my sister to take me outside. My grandparents were worried I might get another disease from exposure, but being stuck inside only made me sicker.

One typical day, I was nagging my sister to take me outside to play while she ate lunch. I often dictated the day’s plan to her, usually including swimming in the pond for two hours or finding five grasshoppers per person. She kept silent, and I watched her spoon move up and down. That meant “no.” I was persistent. I was such a willful girl, and my sister never rejected my begging. She was usually nice to me, but on that day I pinched her arm ceaselessly. Whenever she tried to take a bite, I tapped her right elbow and ran away. In a fit of anger, she finally threw her spoon in my direction, and it smacked me right on the forehead. I was frightened and cried out for Grandmother. My grandmother was startled by my scream, and by the time she entered the room, a big bump had already swelled up on my forehead. My sister seized with fear, grabbed my hand, and both of us flew outside. I was happy, no matter the bump on my head; I had won.

While we walked, she pouted. “I don’t feel like going outside today. I had a bad dream: you ran away like Mom did. You didn’t turn around even though I shouted to stop you.”

Maybe she thought the dream meant something would happen to us. Maybe she intuitively felt that that day might change our lives.

As always, we went to the hills, where we liked to play, but my sister was much stricter than usual; she wouldn’t let me out of her sight. Squatting, she watched me idly as I played, rolling on the ground and stomping on leaves. Eventually I dragged her to the valley. The water was cold, but I didn’t care. I tried to take off my clothes to swim. She pulled my arms and warned me, her eyes glaring, “No. Swimming season is over. From today, we’re not going to swim until next summer.”

We sat in silence. “Didn’t you hear something from over there?” she asked, repeatedly.

I grew bored because she wouldn’t play at all; she insisted on keeping a sharp lookout. Nothing happened—her worrying seemed useless—and on the way home I muttered to her, “You are weird today. You screwed up everything. It’s the most boring day I’ve ever had.”

Still she looked around and spoke under her breath. “No, Jia. I’m serious. I swear with my ten fingers. I heard something around us several times.”

The days were growing shorter. By the time we arrived at the house, it was already dark, but it wasn’t any different from an ordinary night. My sister didn’t seem relieved until we finished dinner and played our favorite word game, where you link the last syllable of one word to a new word. Grandmother was always on my side; otherwise, there was no way to beat my sister. She grumbled about Grandmother’s help and tried to get Grandfather on her team.

Just as we were tiring of the game, a low sound came through the door. Only my sister heard it. She swiftly glanced toward the door and gave Grandfather a scared look. “Did you hear, Grandpa?”

He turned to my sister. “What? Did you hear something?”

A moment later, the sound reached our ears clearly. We looked toward the door all at once. Nobody stopped by our house at that time of night. In fact, we never had any visitors at all.

“Who is it?” Grandmother asked Grandfather in a low voice, a startled look in her eyes. I tried to stand up, but my sister pressed me down.

The sound came again. Grandfather turned toward the door. “Who is it?”

“Can I come in? Please…” A man’s voice, beyond the door.

We watched each other’s faces. I said to Grandfather, “Open the door. It’s cold out.”

He hesitated for a moment and then opened the door cautiously.

There was a man standing in the doorway. He wore an army uniform.

“Do you have something to eat?”

His skinny face was darkly stained, as though he washed with soot. He clasped his hands in front of his stomach, as if to show he meant no harm. If we were frightened of a stranger’s unexpected visit, he seemed even more frightened by the encounter.

“We don’t have any food that would satisfy you.”

“It’s okay. I can eat anything. I haven’t eaten for two days.”

With that, Grandfather let him in. He looked around the room restlessly before sitting down right in front of the door. My sister stepped behind her and stuck to the wall, dragging me next to her. She held my hand tightly.

Grandfather said to Grandmother, “Bring some food he can eat.” She looked at him with suspicious eyes and slid into the kitchen without a word.

“Thank you,” the man said. I remember thinking he had a funny way of speaking. I tried to get a closer look at him, but my sister warned me, giving me sharp pinches.

“I’ve become lost.” He took off his hat and pointed a finger at us. “I followed those kids all day. Otherwise, I would have wandered around the mountains for one more night.”

My sister opened her eyes wide and looked at me to let me know that she had been right about hearing noises during the day.

The man gave us a smile, and I smiled back at him. He didn’t look like a bad guy.

Grandfather told us to offer our seats. That was the warmest place in the room, where my sister and I always sit. We moved next to Grandfather, and I finally got out of my sister’s grip. Grandmother opened the kitchen door and asked Grandfather, “Do you want me to heat up the fire-place?”

The stranger shook both his hands to stop my grandmother. “No. It’s warm enough. You don’t have to…I mean it. This is already heaven to me. Sorry to give you such trouble.”

A little later, Grandmother set the table. I stood up nimbly and took the dishes from her hands, asking the soldier with a smile, “Do you want some plain water or scorched rice water? I recommend my grandmother’s scorched rice water—it’s really good.” I didn’t care about my sister anymore, and I dodged her gaze.

“Thank you. Either one is fine,” he said, smiling, showing his white and well-arranged teeth.

I brought him some fairly hot scorched rice water. Grandmother always made it, boiling the leftover cooked rice, stuck in the pot, in water for a long time over a low fire. We sipped it before or after our actual meal because it made our stomachs warm and full. It was too hot to drink in one stretch, and sometimes I burned my tongue. I couldn’t understand how my grandparents could drink something so hot and then say, in a satisfied voice, “Hu! How cool it is!”

When I asked them how they could refer to such a hot drink as cool, they tried to explain. “Even though it’s hot, when it goes down along your throat and arrives at your stomach, you can feel it make your insides so clean and cool.” Seeing my dissatisfaction, they would grin and say, “You’ll understand when you grow up.”

The soldier sat at the table and wolfed down his food as we all looked on quietly. He said, “I’m taking a guerilla training course that is supposed to last for three months. It’s my first time in these mountains—we just arrived here five days ago. When I was doing an individual exercise, I got lost.”

While the man spoke, Grandfather rolled a cigarette with thin paper he brought from the mines. “There is an army training camp,” Grandfather replied. “I know where it is. Crossing the mine is a shortcut to get there. I’ll take you over there.” He put the cigarette on the table for the stranger and made another for himself.

“Thanks. It was lucky to run into those kids. I was thinking of asking for help as soon as I saw them, but I was afraid they might be scared. So I followed them and was hesitating at the door.”

Grandfather looked at him closely. “Are you a professional soldier? You look a little old to be going through guerilla training for the first time.”

Putting the spoon and chopsticks down on the table, he nodded slightly to my grandmother as a token of gratitude. He watched all of us and cautiously answered, “No. I’m not. I was a fisherman. Actually, I’m from South Korea.”

I could feel my grandfather’s and grandmother’s faces suddenly go stiff. And my sister grabbed my hand with such force that I yelped with pain. I didn’t know why his answer provoked such a reaction; I knew my country was called North Korea. But it seemed that I was the only one who couldn’t really figure out the meaning of what he said, and nobody explained it to me. Feeling an ache in my fingers, I cried out to my sister, “Ouch! You’re killing my fingers! Why are you doing that?”

My grandfather became animated and nervous, and he turned to Grandmother and said, “Why haven’t you cleared the table? He is already finished.”

She stood up hastily, grabbing the dishes. “Right, what am I doing? Dying is what the old do best,” she said—a typical elderly Korean response.

My sister started to help, but with a serious face Grandfather ordered us to bed. “It’s already late. Sleep!” My sister unfolded a blanket in the corner of the room, hanging her head, but still stealing glances at the soldier.

Grandfather said to the stranger, “Let me know when you want to leave.”

The man replied, with consternation, “I will not hurt your family. Anyhow, I’m in North Korea now. And I’m not trying to decamp. I’ll go back to the unit—it’ll be okay.”

The soldier and my grandparents stayed up all night, talking. I tried not to sleep, forcing my eyes open wide. I wanted to hear what they were saying. I sat next to the stranger, propped up against his knee, but my eyelids grew heavy, and at length I fell asleep there. I heard him say he had come to North Korea a year before, on a deep-sea fishing vessel. The ship was fishing close to Chinese waters; what they ran into was not abundant fish, but an armada that glittered with a strange light. More than ten Chinese soldiers boarded his ship. According to them, his ship had violated international law. All the sailors, including him, were taken to North Korea that night. There, he and his comrades were forced to attend ideology classes and military training in the mountains where we lived. During the maneuvers, he became lost.

When I opened my eyes again, it was already morning. The soldier was gone. I was lying next to my grandmother, who was about to leave for the camp. I got up in a flurry and demanded, “Where is he? Where did he go?”

“He already left. Your grandfather sent him off. But he said he’ll come back.”

I waited for the soldier for several days, but he didn’t return. He was the first visitor to our house, and his arrival had stirred a strange excitement in me; his accent was so new and curious.

Several days later, at night, he returned. As with his first visit, we heard a cautious knock at the door. I jumped for joy at seeing him again, and leaped into his arms. He smiled broadly.

He visited our house several times but never could stay long. It was strictly prohibited for him to be absent without leave. He sneaked out of his guard post and came to see us, sometimes bringing army food for my sister and me. I always cried when he left. I wasn’t sure whether I would see him again.

Whenever he visited us, my grandparents and he always discussed North Korea and South Korea. It was hard to understand what they were really saying; they spoke in such soft voices and used words I had never heard before. My grandfather never showed his feelings on his face, but it was easy to see how happy the soldier’s visits made him. Grandmother said he was about my father’s age and had a seven-year-old girl, the same age as me, in the South. Perhaps I reminded him of his daughter. He always propped me on his knee while he was in my house, checking on my studies. I took to calling him Uncle Shin, a nickname that indicated an almost familial closeness.

After several weeks, Uncle Shin said the army was leaving soon. My grandparents just nodded quietly, and we didn’t talk about his leaving that night, but the next day I began asking my grandparents if we could go with him. I remembered he said he had been in Pyongyang, the capital, and I whimpered that I wanted to go to the city and live there. They only patted my head.

The day before Shin was to leave, my grandfather called me softly, looking outside through the open door. Grandmother had taken my sister to the mountains to pick some herbs for dinner. I was sulking about being left behind.

Grandfather sat me in front of him and said, “Jia, do you want to go to school?”

I was taken aback by the sudden question, but I instantly said, “Yes.”

“Do you want to meet your mom’s parents?”

“The people wearing good clothes in the pictures? Yes, sure.” Quickly, I covered my mouth with both hands, because I was not supposed to know about the pictures. He ignored my admission and rolled a cigarette, casting his eyes down. “If you go with Uncle Shin, you can study in a nice school, meet Mom’s parents, eat very well, and have lots of toys and clothes. If you stay here with us, you can’t meet good teachers or have lots of friends. Do you want to go with him?”

“Okay.”

He seemed a bit surprised by my easy, instant reply but merely took a deep pull on his cigarette. A little later, my grandmother and sister returned empty-handed, having found no herbs.

That night, my grandmother put my clothes in a small, gray, decrepit bag. Leading me to the kitchen, she gave me my grandparents’ and my mother’s pictures. One photograph, taken when my sister was just born, showed my mother holding her infant in her arms. This picture was my sister’s most valuable possession.

“In the place you’re going, show these pictures and say these are your grandparents and your mother. If people ask you where you are from, what your parents are doing, and where they are, don’t say anything. Just say you don’t remember. Don’t talk to strangers before you meet your grandparents. Just tell them you have pictures and you know they are of your grandparents and mom, and that the baby is you. Say you have to meet them. The pictures will definitely take you to your grandparents. Okay? Erase your whole memory of this place. You’ll miss us, but don’t ask other people to take you back here—it might put our lives at risk. It’s for your safety and our safety. You understand, Jia?”

I couldn’t understand why they were so serious, but I nodded my head on and on. It was then that Grandmother told me the story of my parents, how they fell in love and why they were torn apart. She assured me that my mother’s death was natural, and not my fault. My grandmother was treating me like an adult, and it delighted me.

That night, Uncle Shin came back, and my grandmother served him a whole table full of dishes. My sister and I were beside ourselves at the sight of all the food: jangjolim (beef boiled in soy sauce) and steamed potato with glazed millet jelly, which we only ate on special days, like the Great Leader’s birthday. As we wolfed the food down noisily, I completely forgot about leaving and the conversations with my grandparents.

Tapping my stomach, filled to satisfaction, I fell asleep as usual while they talked. In the middle of the night, my body was shaken awake, and when I opened my eyes I saw only my grandmother’s face close to mine. She spoke in a whisper, “Jia. Get up. You have to leave right now.”

I tried to rub the sleep out of my eyes; I didn’t expect it so soon.

“Where?”

“Get up. Put these clothes on.”

She dressed me hurriedly. I was still so sleepy. “Do I have to go right now?”

“Yes—there’s no time.”

Still I rubbed my eyes, looking for my sister. She was in a deep slumber next to me, “How about Sister?”

With flushed cheeks, Grandmother buttoned my dark-green coat—my sister’s favorite. “She is not going right now. Hurry.” She led me by my hand outside.

Uncle Shin and Grandfather were already outside waiting for me. Everything was dark. I asked my grandfather, again, “Is my sister going with me?” I didn’t want to leave by myself, though I was happy to go anywhere with Uncle Shin.

“No. She’s not going to go.” Grandfather strapped my small bag on my back.

Uncle Shin stooped to level his eyes with mine. He smiled and rubbed my head. “Ready to go?”

“Why do we have to go right now? Let’s go later. It’s still night.”

Uncle Shin took my hand, still rubbing my eyes. “No… it’s already late. Let’s go right now, Jia.”

He exchanged brief words with my grandparents; my grandfather patted his shoulder. My grandmother hugged me tightly and my grandfather stood up next to her, smoking. With a blank face, he said, “Don’t forget what we told you, Jia.”

I couldn’t even say good-bye to my sister. When I looked back, my grandparents were just two dark lumps under the starlight. They didn’t move until my eyes lost sight of them.

 

I couldn’t walk very well in the dark; Uncle Shin carried me on his back, walking fast, and talked about his daughter. Half asleep, I heard only part of what he said.

“I never carried my daughter on my back. Can you believe that? I was such a strict father. I always wanted to kiss her cheek and hug her, but I just didn’t. I didn’t know how to express my feelings about her. She was my treasure…such a treasure. I was not a good father, but she always jumped on me whenever I came home, like you did.”

I wondered if my father would carry me on his back, if he saw me just one time.

We had been walking for quite some time when Uncle Shin suddenly stopped and looked around. Emerging from the bushes, we came to a big road, and he took me down from his back, holding my two arms before me.

“Jia, just sit down here and don’t move. Wait for two army cars to come. When you see them, sit up and wave your hands. If you see me among those soldiers, pretend you don’t know me, just say you’re lost. Whatever they ask, say you don’t remember anything and ask us to take you to your home, then show the pictures and say they’re your grandparents. Do you understand, Jia? I know you are a very smart girl. I know it will be scary to be here by yourself, but it’s just for a few hours. After that, we’ll take you to your grandparents safely.”

He gave me rice balls with sesame oil and salt and a brown red-bean cake.

“If you feel hungry, eat these.”

Uncle Shin sat me by the road at the edge of the bushes. It was almost dawn.

As he ran away, uphill, he turned back and shouted, “It’ll be bright soon! Don’t be scared!”

Then he disappeared from sight.

I was totally alone. It was cold and there was nothing but trees and grass in every direction. I had never been so far away from home, and the path I was on lay far beyond the realm that I knew, back in the forest. I looked back at the world that had been my home; now, from the outside, it no longer felt familiar. Tall reeds swayed in the wind. I heard the occasional stirring of cicadas in the bushes. Starting and then falling silent, the more the insects cried, the closer they seemed to me. I was frightened an animal would appear in front of me and attack me.

I began sobbing, crumpling with fear. I missed my sister and grandparents. I didn’t know what I was doing. I couldn’t understand why I had to meet my mom’s parents this way. After I had exhausted myself I lay down on the road, curled up, and fell asleep.

I didn’t hear the cars pull up and stop in front of me. One of the men nudged me with his boots, and I woke up to find soldiers all around, looking down at me.

“Hey, kid. What are you doing here?”

I was confused, I thought I was still in our room at home, lying next to my sister, but my surroundings were strange. I couldn’t answer his question. I was too scared to talk at all, and froze until my eyes fixed on Uncle Shin. He was almost covered by the other soldiers, but at the sight of me, he smiled slightly, his eyes filled with worry. As soon as I found his face, I remembered the night journey and falling asleep alone in the darkness. I burst into tears, not out of fear, but comfort—relieved that I had discovered him.

“Look at this girl…”

One soldier sat down to console me. He had bushy eyebrows that wriggled along above his eyes like two pine-eating caterpillars whenever he spoke. He stood me up, dusted off my coat, and said, “Why do you sleep here? Where’s your house?”

“I don’t know where I am. I’m looking for my grandparents,” I sobbed.

“How did you get here?”

“I don’t know. Take me to my grandparents.”

I wanted to go back to the mountain. I missed my grandparents and wanted to jump into their arms.

“Do you have your birth ID?” he took the backpack from my back and handed it to another soldier next to him, who opened it to search inside.

“No. I don’t have it.”

Their faces wore worried looks.

“Where do they live?”

I looked at Uncle Shin. His eyes tried to say something through his nervous countenance. I followed my grandmother’s instruction exactly: “Pyongyang.” His head nodded slightly with a smile.

“Do you live there?” The bushy-eyebrow man gave a suspicious look. I nodded my head lightly.

“But why are you here right now? This is far away from Pyongyang—a kid can’t get here alone.”

“I don’t know. I was here when I opened my eyes. Take me to my grandparents,” I wailed.

“How can we find them?”

The soldier searching my backpack handed the pictures to the bushy-eyebrow man, and the other soldiers moved in to look at them.

“How can we find them with these pictures?”

The soldiers made a fuss about that, and the bushy-eyebrow man stood up. Uncle Shin spoke out from behind, “Let’s take her with us. We can ask some government offices to find her grandparents.”

“No, it’s too much hassle. She may be from the limited area close to here,” the bushy-eyebrow soldier murmured, touching his chin.

The soldier holding the pictures looked at them one more time. “But look at these—her grandfather is obviously a general with a high position. We’d better take her to the government office—they’ll take care of her.”

The bushy-eyebrow man hesitated and looked at me for a while, his eyebrows undulating with thought. He gathered the pictures and put them back into my backpack. “Is there anything else in there?”

“No, just some clothes, nothing else,” the soldier said, shrugging his shoulders.

“Take her in the car. Let’s move. Get in the cars, men. Hurry, we’re late now!”

I got in the same car as Uncle Shin, and he told the others he’d take care of me. He held my hand without a word, but when the car started moving, he whispered, “Good girl. You did a good job. You’ll meet your grandparents soon,” and rubbed my back softly. I wanted to say how scared I was during the night and that I wanted to go back to the mountain, but sitting next to him, all I felt was relief, and I held his hand tightly. I rebuffed the soldiers’ questions until they grew tired of asking, and gave me whatever food they had in their pockets. Uncle Shin pulled a khaki cotton blanket over my legs and hugged me tightly.

I fell asleep, but awoke with a start several times. I kept having nightmares of my grandparents and sister being tied together by a thick metal chain and dragged into a deep cave. My sister stared at me and cursed, Everything is because of you. Because of you… I cried out, I’ll go with you. Don’t leave me! But my grandfather called down to me, Don’t come here. You’re not part of our family anymore. Then they left together and disappeared, leaving me in the middle of a terrific darkness.

I awoke, choked with tears, crying, “Grandmother! Grandfather! Don’t leave me!” The soldiers thought I was crying for the grandparents in the pictures, and Uncle Shin cradled me until I fell asleep.

I awoke the final time to his words, “Jia, get up! We’ve arrived in Pyongyang.”

I opened my eyes and looked toward the open back of the truck.

The car was still moving—not on the rugged mountain path, but on even asphalt. There were high buildings in all directions, and a big golden statue, stretching its arm up to the sky, came in sight. That was my first glimpse of Pyongyang.