Therese Park

Wearing his glasses, my father studied the map attached to the letter announcing the new location of the school and when classes would begin. "It's near the Buddhist temple," he said. "Do you know how to find it?" he asked my younger brother Kwon and me.
“Yes.”
The ancient, colossal temple with a pagoda in the front was easily visible from anywhere in the neighborhood, including the playground at Crystal Elementary School.
The retreating South Korean Army had taken over our school building to shelter injured soldiers almost immediately after the communists had invaded the South (June 25, 1950), and we had the longest summer vacation we ever had--eight weeks instead of four. Other than visiting the wounded soldiers at various school buildings and entertaining them with songs and dances, we didn’t have much to do all day. I was ready for school.
"The new school is outdoors," Father said. "It's nothing like your old school. Don't be disappointed that you don't have desks and chairs or a blackboard. Considering that many people have lost their homes, family, and all their possessions, you're lucky to have a school to go to. You can learn anywhere, indoors or outdoors, standing up or sitting down."
"Yes, Father."
"One other thing," he said. "Hiking is good exercise. People pay money to go hiking, but you're doing it without spending a coin. You're lucky that way, too."
"I'm ready for school," I confessed. “I miss my friends.”
"Good. Until next Monday, you have five days to review what you've learned before your school closed. And don’t forget to ask your mother to get you some new clothes and socks."
"We won’t."
Father dismissed us with a nod, as he always did, and I went to my room. It had been only two months since we were out of school, but it seemed like years.
I missed Yoja the most. She was the shortest kid in our class who lived in a village that didn’t have a public school. Her train-conductor father dropped her off at the station every morning, like a package, on his way to the main station downtown, and she walked to my house to fetch me. After school, she would follow me home like a stray puppy and wait for the five-thirty train, eating everything I ate and doing homework with me. Sometimes I was tired of being with her so many hours, but unlike Kwon who thought I wasn't worth much, Yoja respected me because she regarded me as her bodyguard.
The street gangs were always looking for a tiny thing like Yoja walking alone, who might have a coin or two in her pocket. Once, when I had been sick and missed school, Yoja was attacked and came away with bruises on her face and empty pockets. "It wouldn't have happened if you were with me," she said to me when I returned to school. I hadn't been too sympathetic for her, because the neighborhood boys never bothered me. They knew I could scream like an ambulance. Once I had tagged along with the cook to the market, and while she was bargaining with a fish vendor, I wandered alone. As I idly admired the intoxicating smell of roasted chestnut at one corner, a hand suddenly snatched me and began dragging me away. I screamed just as I knew how. My assailant, a boy my oldest brother's age, let go of me and vanished like the wind. I had an unexpected feast afterwards as many vendors felt sorry for me and gave me roasted chestnuts, boiled corn, and sticky taffy to take home.
I had so many things I wanted to tell Yoja, about the refugees who lived with us, especially the little boy who had died in our own house, and five days seemed too long to wait. But like always, time flew before I knew it.
At seven-thirty on Monday morning, I heard Yoja singing "Jong-ahhhhhhh" at the top of her lungs, and I rushed to the door with my worn book bag in my hand.
"I missed you, Jong-ah!" Yoja shrieked the moment she saw me, and I said, "Me too. The vacation was awfully long without you."
She giggled. I always felt taller, older, and smarter when I was with her. She showed me her new book bag--a red one with leather straps--and I showed her my new black and white canvas shoes. I wished I had a new book bag, too, like hers, but Mother said mine was only a year old and that a book bag should last for several years.
The air was crisp and the sky clear blue as Yoja and I headed for school. Many school kids walked along with us, chattering nonstop, each with a book bag in hand. For a while, walking was easy because the dirt road was wide and leveled, but when it changed into a narrow trail, we began to sweat. I helped Yoja whenever she slipped on the loose gravel and fell to her knees, and she did the same for me. By the time we reached the Buddhist temple, we were exhausted.
A wooden post bearing Chinese letters that said "Temporary Crystal Elementary School" stood on the front lawn of the temple. From there, the view of the town was almost surreal. In the early morning haze, our neighborhood looked like a toy village in a cartoon movie. Army trucks wormed through the streets. Houses puffed wisps of smoke through chimneys. The vendors at market were ants setting up their tiny booths. A cluster of clouds hung so low that I thought I could touch it with a long stick. At the seashore beyond, American ships glided through the calm blue water, each with a flag on its mast, blaring horns as if promising victory. We were in a different world now, broader and loftier than the one I had known all my nine years.
As Father had warned us, there was no schoolhouse or jungle gyms or swing set that I could see. Instead, overgrown weeds brushed against my legs and cow paddies dried in the brilliant sunlight here and there amid rocks of all sizes and shapes. I missed our old school that had jungle gyms, seesaws, a room-size sandbox, and several monkey bars.
More kids showed up, wiping their foreheads and panting like dogs. Two boys next to me had crew cuts and spoke in a Seoul dialect. For some reason, they looked smarter and more mature than the local boys whose heads were shaven like temple monks. One of the two boys saw me staring and snarled, "What are you looking at, girl?"
"Nothing," I said, turning away.
"Do you like me, country girl? Tell me. You were staring at me!"
Country girl? I was furious, yet I felt intimidated. I should have paid no attention to them, I thought.
The other boy, the shorter one, said, "She wants you to kiss her, dummy," and sniggered.
My face was on fire. I pretended I didn't hear what he said and moved closer to Yoja. The local boys would never use the word "kiss" to us girls. They would tease us, calling, "fatso” or "squash flowers", but they knew better than saying such a bad word as "kiss" at school.
Yoja suddenly nudged my elbow. "Mia's parents died during vacation!"
"What?" I wasn't sure if I heard her right.
"Nam-hee just told me. Mia is an orphan now. Her father died during a guerrilla attack on Chiri Mountain some weeks ago and her mother was killed just last week. Can you believe it?"
I couldn't believe it. "How does Nam-hee know?"
"Why wouldn't she?" said Yoja, in all knowing manner. "She lives on the same block as Mia does."
Poor Mia. I wasn't too surprised to hear that her father had died some weeks earlier. He was a soldier. Everyday the radio announced how many soldiers were killed and how many wounded and how many captured. But Mia's mother wasn't a soldier.
"How did she die?" I asked.
"She was on her way to church last Sunday morning, Nam-hee said, and her long chima got caught in the wheels of an American truck racing by. You know how those Yankees drive, don’t you? She died instantly."
Mia was the first girl I knew who lost both of her parents. I couldn't even imagine what it would be like not having both of my parents. What’s going to happen to her? I asked, and Yoja said that her grandparents took her and her younger sister to Kim-hae, a town some distance north of Pusan.
It saddened me that I would never see her again. Mia had many warts on her hands, which she hated. During class, she used to poke them with her nails until they bled. Still, she could do many things with her wart-covered hands that I couldn't do. She could knit with two bamboo-needles and some old yarn. She could scribble some Chinese letters I was unfamiliar with. She even made a doll with tall grass blades, using a stick to make it stand up. I couldn't believe that she would no longer be with us.
Everyone had something to talk about. I overheard that our music teacher and some others teachers joined the military and were now fighting somewhere south of Taejon. Mr. Lee had a rich tenor voice and taught us to sing choir. For some reason, he used to make me sing in front of the kids, which I didn't like. I hoped that he wouldn’t die.
The principal appeared, wearing large, dark-rimmed glasses that made him look like an owl wearing a man's suit. Positioning himself on a huge flat rock, Mr. Owl began speaking, but we could barely hear him. Worse yet, whenever an American airplane passed overhead, we only saw his lips moving.
He went on and on, and then suddenly he began shouting, throwing his arms upward. Everyone shouted, too, lifting his or her arms like the principal.
"Destroy communism!"
“Demolish Kim Il Sung and his Red soldiers!"
"Down with Stalin and the Soviet Union!"
"Down with Mao Tse-tung and Red China!”
"Victory, United Nations!"
"Long live President Rhee and South Korea!"
"Long live President Truman and every American soldier in our country!"
The shouting abruptly ended, and he stepped down.
Teacher Kim gathered and led us to a spot directly
behind the temple. It was quiet. The cool breeze was delightful in our lungs. We could see the back of the ancient structure and two stone Buddhist gods smiling serenely. While Miss Kim organized her books and papers for the class, we sat on the bare dirt and looked around. Some hens and chicks paraded through our classroom, pecking on our pencils, erasers, and notebooks, as if tasting them. A dozen pigs in a pen showed no interest in anything except eating, their heads buried in feed, but the cows tied to the posts in the corner welcomed us with friendly moos, bells ringing.
Everywhere I looked, there was something entertaining. A colorful funeral procession followed the mountain trail, the chanter's voice shrilling through the fields and valleys. The monks walked along the curvy trail, each with a begging-sack attached to his side. Several women at a silvery brook down below were busy, beating their laundry with wooden sticks and talking at the same time.
An old, stooped monk approached Miss Kim and they chatted for a moment. Teacher Kim turned to us.
"Children, Master Chang would like to have a word with you. He's the headmaster here at the temple. Please welcome him!" She began clapping and we all clapped.
"Good morning, children," he said in unhurried words. "Welcome to the Temple of Heaven and Earth. I'm glad I have this chance to meet you and talk to you about these mountains. When I was your age some fifty years ago, we were afraid to climb here because there was a thick forest here, and tigers, bears, and wolves roamed everywhere."
How amazing, I thought. How did we lose the trees and animals?
"In the beginning of the century, the Japanese came and chopped down all of the trees and destroyed the homes of wildlife. Do you know what they did with the lumber? They made battleships, airplanes, and weapons to destroy people and civilization. It's sad, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"There's something I want you to remember while you're here. This temple is a sacred place. These two statues you're looking at are gods who watch over the mountains. Twice we found them weeping. I'm serious, children. The first time was in the early forties when the specially trained Japanese policemen butchered many Korean activists, and the second time was last June, after the North Koreans invaded South Korea."
I had never heard of Buddhist gods crying. I knew the Virgin Mary appeared to some children in Europe and told them to pray the rosary. I felt uneasy because I didn't know how to pray to Buddhist gods.
Master Change was still talking. "Do not destroy any living things here on the mountain--trees, flowers, bugs, squirrels, frogs, anything that's alive and breathing. If you do, Lord Buddha will weep again. Do you understand?"
"Yes."
"If we take care of what we have on this earth, the heavens god will bless us, and someday these hills and valleys will be covered with thick foliage again. The god of nature will replenish what was lost if he sees that we deserve it. Keep the place clean, too, children. Do not throw away any paper or candy wrappers. I want you to enjoy the clean and fresh mountain air and peaceful surroundings, while you share this temple of gods with us. Well, that's all I have to say for now. Have a good day and be good to your teacher." His hands folded, Master Chang bowed to us and then to Teacher Kim.
Teacher Kim bowed back, and the old monk headed off toward the boys' class beneath us, the end of his ashen coat catching the gentle wind.
That first day on the mountain, we learned a valuable lesson: not having desks and chairs or blackboards wasn't a serious problem for school kids, but not having bathrooms was. We girls complained to Teacher Kim about it.
"I don't know what to tell you," she said, showing wrinkles on her forehead. "I can ask Master Chang to let you girls use their outhouse, but I doubt he'd say yes. Hauling away human waste is very expensive here on the mountains. Why don't you go under big rocks or behind bushes? Know what I mean?"
It wasn't easy finding a safe and private spot under the bright sun in an open meadow. A boy or two would suddenly appear and yell, "Look, the girls are peeing over there!" and then a bunch of them would rush toward us like mischievous puppies, yelping and giggling. We used secret codes and messages among ourselves to indicate when and where to go, but the boys always knew exactly where to find us. We had no choice but to train ourselves to delay the urge until we were safely home.
Besides not having bathrooms, we had no textbooks either. The first few days Teacher Kim had us write letters to the soldiers on the front, and we wrote many of them. But on the fifth day, when the books still had not arrived, she taught us a song called “To Father with Love.“

Primroses and balsams bloomed, Father,
Along the fence we planted together,
Reminding me of the day you left
Turning back and back again as I waved.

You promised you'd be back with gifts
When the flowers bloom and I'm taller.
I wait by the window, my ears open
Hurry, before the flowers fade away.

I enjoyed singing toward the open air, looking at the layers of the distant mountains ahead. The song made me wonder what it would be like if my father was fighting somewhere and I couldn’t see him any more. The melody stayed with me all day, along with an image of a young girl waiting for her father.
On weekends, we visited our old school building, not to study there but to entertain wounded soldiers with songs and some gifts we made with our own hands. Every room smelled of alcohol. Soldiers lay side by side on military cots, like sardines in a can. They seemed glad to see us when we filed in and sang for them. Whenever we finished a song, they applauded loudly, and we sang every song we knew. When we left, many of them said, "Thank you, girls. Please come back!" We responded to them by smiling and waving our hands.
One afternoon, our teacher told us that we would entertain American soldiers the following Sunday. We couldn't believe it.
"Music is an international language," she said. "It's a powerful way to say thank you to the American soldiers fighting for us. You'll each make a thank-you card tomorrow, and the parents' association will prepare some gifts for them, too, which you're going to deliver to the soldiers on Sunday."
"They can't read what we write," the class leader pointed out.
"That's okay,” Teacher Kim answered. “They will know what you mean, because the language of the heart is the same everywhere. They'll be happy to hear any song, but I think it will be nice if we can sing some American songs for them, don't you think?"
"Yes!"
Until late that afternoon, she taught us an American song titled "Danny Boy" translated into Korean. We felt grand as we sang "Danny Boy" over and over until we memorized it.
The night before our grand appearance before the American soldiers, Mother ironed my red-white Korean dress and told me to try it on. I did and stood before the mirror in the front room. Although the fabric was stiff and scratchy against my neck, I loved the dress with roomy, rainbow-colored sleeves. When I lifted my arms, I resembled a huge tropical bird soaring in the sky. When I stood erect, arms at my sides, I was a young bride in a storybook, waiting for my groom to arrive. And when I stretched my skirt wide open and whirled around the room, I was a folk dancer. Sunday couldn’t come fast enough for me.
Mother said, "Make sure not to rip the hem. You're too clumsy sometimes."

On Sunday afternoon around two, we waited in front of the three-story building surrounded by a red brick fence. A long line of schoolchildren our age was there too. Two American sentries, one on each side of the black iron-gate, allowed only one group in at a time, and when our turn came, a Korean man wearing an American army uniform appeared and motioned us to follow him. In the corridor many American soldiers with long legs and big noses passed by us, smiling. We saw no Koreans, except the one leading us. The walls on both sides were white and clean. We entered a large room where many gaunt soldiers sat on benches and watched some dancers on the stage, smoking.
Soon, it was our turn. Facing the soldiers, under Teacher Kim's baton, we sang one song after another. When we sang "Danny Boy," the soldiers applauded loudly; some even whistled with fingers in their mouths. With Teacher Kim's quick nod and broad smile, we sang "Danny Boy" again as an encore. More applause followed.
The same Korean soldier came and ushered us to another building connected by a long corridor that had many windows on both sides. In front of a large room, we stopped.
"These men are wounded," the Korean man informed us. "Be careful not to touch any devices in the room as you go in. And don't make too much noise.”
Our teacher gave each of us a white silk handkerchief embroidered with delicate hibiscus, our national flower, and we filed into the room. Teacher Kim didn't follow. She stood and watched us from a window.
Awkwardly, I moved to a bed next to a wall where a soldier with a crew cut lay, his face ghostly pale. He didn't seem much older than my oldest brother. I bowed to him and he smiled. I handed him the handkerchief and the thank-you note I had written on rice paper with an ink brush that said, “Thank you for fighting for us and God bless you!”
The soldier babbled something in English. I just stared at him, uncomfortable. He inspected the handkerchief, flipping it twice, before he laid it on his pillow. He then opened my note. He smiled as if he understood what I wrote. Then, he did something strange: He took my note to his lips and kissed it.
I quickly bowed to him and left his side, feeling my cheeks burning. I don't remember how I came out of the room, but I saw Teacher Kim smiling. "Very good," she said, nodding slowly. What was very good? I wanted to know, but I didn't ask. After everyone came out we followed the Korean soldier to the gate.
Riding the bus home, I kept thinking about that pale-looking soldier. I wondered if he had a sister or a niece or a cousin my age in America and he missed her. I also wished that he wouldn’t die so that he could go back to his country.

One day on the mountain the sky suddenly darkened and raindrops as large as American marbles began falling on our heads. Teacher Kim dismissed us immediately and we packed our bags in a hurry. Grabbing Yoja's hand, I headed for the narrow trail like everyone else. In the mad dash, I fell, dragging Yoja to the ground with me. Before I could worry about my new shoes, a bright light blinded my eyes and ear-shattering thunder followed. Pulling myself up, I helped Yoja to her feet, and together we joined others. Some men I had never seen before waited for us where the dirt trail ended and the gravel road began. "Hurry, children!" they yelled, waving us on. "The creek is rising fast."
A fierce light flashed and vanished. Thunder roared louder than ever. I imagined that bombs were exploding on our heads. We ran faster. At the silvery brook, we jumped over together without falling, and we kept running.
Mother, holding a large bamboo umbrella, met us at the door. "Where's Kwon?" she demanded.
I had no breath left to tell her I had no idea where my younger brother was. I only blinked.
"You don't know?"
I shook my head.
"Why don't you know?"
I clamped my mouth shut. After falling and getting soaked like a mouse rescued from a drain hole, I didn’t want to hear her say, "Where's Kwon?" I hoped to hear, "I'm glad you made it, Jong-ah," but ”Where’s Kwon”? I was of no importance to her, only another mouth she had to feed at mealtime. Angry tears burned my eyes.
"On a day like this," she lectured me, "you must pay attention to your little brother. I'm glad you remembered to bring your friend home, but next time, bring your brother, too."
"Do you want me to go back and bring him home?” I asked her angrily. “Do you care if I die in the rain?"
"What a silly thing to say," Mother said, her tone of voice mellowing a little now. "Let's go inside," she said, pushing Yoja and me toward the enclosed porch.
Grabbing a towel, she began to dry my hair, but I pushed her hand away.
She paused, then asked, "Do you want some barley tea and rice cakes, girls?"
"Keep them for Kwon," I muttered.
"Jong-ah!"
I took Yoja's hand and dragged her to my room.
"Why can't we have some tea and rice cake, Jong-ah?" Yoja asked but I told her to shut up. Burying my face in my pillow I let tears to come. I couldn't stop feeling sorry for myself and I sobbed and sobbed.
Kwon came home within minutes. I heard him tell Mother that the narrow creek, which Yoja and I jumped over earlier, had swelled so much that the third-grade teachers and the neighbors had to carry each child on their backs to the other side of the creek.
The rain didn't stop for days. The wind was so strong that the gingko tree in the corner of the courtyard danced wildly, losing many of its fan-shaped leaves, and the roof tiles rattled like the teeth of giant skeletons. There was nothing wonderful about watching huge raindrops exploding in the courtyard. It was spooky.
The rain finally stopped after five days and school resumed. The mountain was ever so beautiful after a rain. Everything sparkled with renewed vitality: the hills and valleys looked greener, the sky clear blue and bottomless, and boulders whiter and luminous in the bright sunlight. The ground was still wet and soggy, so Miss Kim told us to find two large rocks each, one to sit on and one to put our notebooks on. It took an hour to find all of us the rocks flat enough as desks and chairs.
Miss Kim said we still had no textbooks. "We've been waiting for them to get here, but they're not coming after all," she said. "Everything was lost during an air raid." "Is that supposed to be bad news?" a girl behind me whispered and giggled, but I didn't laugh. The words "air raid" didn't sound funny at all to me.
Teacher Kim lifted a thick bundle of papers from her bag and said, "You're going to copy Korean Literature with your own hands, girls. I borrowed five copies from the other teachers and divided each of them into five sections. When you're done copying one section, exchange it with those who’ve finished another section of the book. You have three weeks to copy all ten chapters."
Coming home, Yoja and I sat at the desk and began to copy the first chapter. It was painstakingly slow, but I enjoyed watching my own handwriting fill the entire notebook page. I said, "I don't mind being a writer when I grow up."
Yoja snorted in my face. "Writers don't make money."
"How do you know?" I asked.
"Everyone knows it."
"What do you want to be when you're older?" I asked.
"Me? A fashion designer! I want to make lots and lots of money making western dresses."