Thailand by Haruki Murakami (Part 1)

There was an announcement. Wee are car rent lee ex peer ee en sing turb you lence. Please re mane see ted an far sin your seat bell.

Just then, Satsuki had been lost in thought, and so it took her some time to make out what the Thai steward’s questionable Japanese had meant.

“We are currently experiencing turbulence. Please remain seated and fasten your seatbelts.”

Satsuki was sweating. It was terribly hot. She felt like she was being boiled alive. She was burning up all over and her nylon stockings and bra were excruciatingly uncomfortable. She wanted to free herself of all her clothes. She craned her neck up and looked around, but it seemed like she was the only one feeling hot. The other passengers in business class avoided the air-con and were curled up asleep with blankets pulled up over their shoulders. Maybe she was having a hot flash. She bit her lip. She tried to concentrate on something else and forget about the heat. She opened up her book and started to read. But inevitably, she couldn’t forget about it. It wasn’t a normal heat. And it would still be quite a while before they arrived at Bangkok. She asked for some water from the stewardess passing by. Then she took her pill case out of her bag and swallowed the hormone pill she’d forgotten to take.

Menopause, thought Satsuki once again, has to be a cynical warning (or harassment, perhaps) from the gods to those humans who dare to aimlessly live too long. Only a hundred years ago, the average life expectancy was no more than fifty, and women living twenty or thirty years after their periods had stopped were the exception, not the rule. The burden of having a body whose thyroid and ovaries don’t secrete hormones regularly, and the possible correlation between post-menstrual oestrogen reduction and Alzheimer’s disease, weren’t issues that she was especially troubled over. For the majority of people, simply getting one’s daily meals is a much more pressing issue. Thinking as such, in the end, doesn’t the growth of medicine just make more problems rise to the surface, and then fragment and complicate them?

Shortly afterwards, there was another announcement. This time it was in English.

“If there is a doctor on the plane, could they please make themselves known to a member of the cabin crew?”

Someone on the plane must have fallen ill. Satsuki wondered if she should come forward, but after a brief consideration, she decided against it. She had twice before come forward as a doctor in such circumstances, but both times, she had ended up coming to head to head with a GP who also happened to be on the plane. GPs have the composure of a long serving officer on the front line, but are also able to observe from a glance specialist pathology which Satsuki had no experience in dealing with.

“Don’t worry, I can handle this on my own. Why don’t you go back and relax?” they would say breezily with a smile. She mumbled out a disjointed excuse and withdrew back to her seat. Then she carried on watching some pointless film.

But what if there was no one but her on the plane who was qualified as a doctor? Or what if this person had a serious problem with their thyroid immune system? If so – though it’s hardly probable – then even she could be of some use. She took a deep breath and pressed the button to call over one of the crew.

The International Thyroid Conference was held over four days in the Bangkok Marriott Hotel. Though really, it was more like an international family reunion than a conference. Everyone there was a thyroid specialist, almost everyone knew almost everyone else, and when they didn’t, they got introduced. Theirs was a small world. In the daytime, they would read out their research papers and have panel discussions; in the evenings they would go to private parties around town. Close friends gathered and old friendships were rekindled. Everyone would drink Australian wine, talk about thyroids, gossip, share news about their work positions, tell lewd medical jokes, and sing the Beach Boys’ Surfer Girl in karaoke bars.

Whilst staying in Bangkok, Satsuki mainly went around with her friends from when she was living in Detroit. She was most carefree when she was with them.  She had worked in the Detroit University Hospital for nearly ten years, and it was there that she had continued to study the thyroid immune system. But while she was working there, things went downhill between her and her American husband, a security analyst. His dependence on alcohol deepened over the years, and, to make matters worse, he had another woman. Satsuki knew her well. They separated and had heated exchanges through their lawyers for the next year. “The final straw was that you didn’t want children,” her husband had argued.

Their divorce mediation was finally concluded three years ago. But then a few months later, when her Honda Accord was parked in the hospital car park, someone had smashed the windows and headlights and written “JAP CAR” in white paint on the front bonnet. She called the police. The policeman, a large black man, filled out the damage report and then said to her,

“Doctor, this is Detroit. Next time buy a Ford Transit.”

After all this, Satsuki no longer wanted to stay in America, and started to think about returning home to Japan. She found a position in Tokyo University Hospital. Her Indian colleague and research collaborator tried to stop her, reminding her of how long she’d been honing her research. “If it all goes well, we could get the Nobel Prize. Isn’t that your dream?” But Satsuki’s resolve to go home was not shaken. It was as though something had snapped inside her.

Anthology by Jang Yong Hak

Once upon a time, there was a cave deep, deep in the mountains. There, in a flower-like house of seven colours, lived a rabbit. The rabbit lived unaware that his walls were made of white marble. With no hole out of which to leave, he was stuck deep beneath the earth, not even knowing how deep down he was. It was a mystery how these rocks inside came to be so strangely arrayed, but a thin streak of sunlight seeped through a crevice and cast down resplendent rapids of light, as if it was passing through a prism. The rabbit had grown up completely ignorant of all unhappiness. Because here, there was nothing but these seven beautiful colours of the rainbow.

Those seven beautiful colours poured out of something like a window in the ceiling. There came a time when he would barely notice this, but start to feel itchy, somewhere, and would start to miss something, though not knowing why. That is to say, that he may have been deep beneath the earth, but even so, he had reached adolescence, and his mind that had once wandered out now withdrew back inside.

 “How beautiful the outside world must be, that it can make such lovely light pour in…” he thought.

Could this be an epiphany? Nay, it was a revolution. The stone house, that had had always seemed so beautiful and charming, suddenly appeared worthless. An owl hooted in the Garden of Eden. But no matter how hard he searched, he couldn’t find an exit to the outside world. The rocks would not move, no matter how much he beat at them and thrust himself against them, tears streaming down his face. They were the ice-cold walls of a prison cell. Only, he should have realised before that he was trapped down there.

How did he come to live here? He had no idea. He had never even thought about such a complex issue. No matter how much he searched his memory, the only thing he could find was those seven colours. Inside his memory muddled with the seven colours of the rainbow, there was some world that gave him some feeling of something infinite, but he didn’t know if that was why he was feeling as he did about the outside world he was imagining before his eyes.

 “The truth is I can’t have lived here all along.”

This was the only conclusion he could come to. And so, he became certain that there was indeed an outside world.

 “The truth is I came in from the outside world. Just like the light streaming in…”

His ears, flopped down in rumination, started to waver inadvertently, and then sprung up as if in surprise. It was his birthday. He wasn’t even happy about this; he just stared vacantly at the window, no longer even thinking about finding an escape. His long, drooping ears sprung up once in surprise and didn’t know how to come back down again.

Pressing down on his trembling heart, he carefully stood up. With quiet footsteps, he went and stood beneath the window. He stood on tiptoe and tried to reach up as high as he could. His hands touched nothing but thin air. He stuck them out further. But still, they didn’t touch a thing. His heart was beating so loudly it seemed to fill the room.

He thought a strange thought and went back to reaching for the window, looking down behind him. He was terrified and tried to shout but the words wouldn’t come out. The whole room started to spin. Petrified, he drew back and collapsed right there.

For days and nights, he lay there, unable to get up. The thought that had come to him on his birthday had been so terrifying that he was now suffering from a severe fever. “What if I can’t get out through the window?” he had thought. He had finally realised this extraordinary truth.

I Can Hear Your Voice by Kim Young Ha

A rope descended from the sky. That in itself was strange. But it was only the beginning so everyone kept their mouths shut. The solemn-faced magician ordered his young assistant to climb up the rope. Though frightened and hesitant, the young assistant followed the magician’s strict ordered and started to climb up the rope. Up, up, and further up. His small body became smaller and smaller and eventually disappeared from the audience’s sight. The magician shouted up at the sky.

“Right, now come back down!” But there was no answer. The magicians’ voice grew louder.

“Just come down! Can’t you hear me?” No response. The audience’s curiosity was piqued. Where on earth does this rope lead? And what happened to that boy who just climbed up it? Could he have arrived in another world, that [strange] world we call heaven?

The magician tugged at the rope in anger. He started to climb up the rope himself in order to find his assistant. Shortly afterwards, the magician too disappeared from everyone’s sight. The distant sky suddenly started to feel heavy. The audience’s necks began to hurt from looking up at the sky. Then all of a sudden, the young assistant’s arms, legs, head and torso fell down from up high, in that order. There was a [dull sound] and fresh blood came splattering down. The white marble floor looked more like a white tablecloth with wine spilled all over it. It was crimson, intense and nauseating. The audience backed away in shock. A little later, the magician came back down the rope with blood stained hands and calmly began to pick up all the pieces of assistant scattered around and put them into a bucket. After tossing it behind him, he looked around reproachfully at the terrified audience. Do you want something more?

But then a sound could be heard from behind the magician. The boy held out the straw mat covering the bucket and walked forward, rubbing his eyes, as if waking up from a long nap. The magician wasn’t surprised. To him, crossing the line between life and death was the most natural thing in the world. The boy disappeared. The boy died. The dead boy came back to life. He started to do summersaults for all those people who couldn’t believe he had been resurrected. They were relaxed now. The boy was obviously alive. Blood was flowing through his arms and legs and his muscles and joints were all working properly. Only then did the audience give loud applause.

The first person to record this magic trick was Ibn Battuta, the known as the Marco Polo of the Islamic world. He witnessed this surprising trick in Hangzhou and recorded it in his vast travelogue. The secrets to many of these tricks have been revealed now, but this rope trick alone remains hidden under a veil.

There are other tales deriving from China. This magic trick was said to have been performed in front of a Chinese emperor. The young emperor was fooled, and he loved it precisely because of this. But the emperor, completely enamoured with this incredible trick, didn’t stop there. His eyes fell on the eunuch, who stood fanning him. The eunuch was dragged out, trembling. There’s no reason to worry. The magician will bring you back to life.

An old vassal stepped forward and tried to dissuade the emperor. It’s nothing more than trickery. But the emperor wouldn’t listen. We’ll find out if it’s trickery or not when we try it. He looked on with curiosity as a large soldier came towards the eunuch, wielding a knife. A rainbow appeared in the fountain of blood. The magician turned his head away from the gruesome scene and hurriedly climbed up the rope into the sky. After he was safely hidden behind the clouds, the rope twisted down to the ground. He looked just like a dragon that had tried and failed to ascend to heaven.

When I first heard this story, I was curious as to where this magician who climbed up above the clouds could have gone. But now I think of his assistant – what happened to the boy the magician left behind at that blood-soaked scene?

A Murderer's Guide to Memorisation (Part 1) by Kim Young Ha

The last time I killed someone was 25 years ago – or was it 26 – anyway, it was around then. The force that drove me up until then was not the impulse that people would generally think of, like a sexual perversion or something. It was regret. The hope that a more perfect pleasure was possible. I repeated this to myself whenever I buried a victim.

I’ll do better next time.

I stopped killing because that hope disappeared.

*

I kept a diary. Level-headedness, I think I needed that. I thought that only if I recorded the mistakes I made and how they made me feel would I avoid repeating the same painful mistakes again. Examinees make note of their errors. I recorded in minute detail every action and feeling related to my murders.

It was pointless.

It was too difficult to make sentences. It wasn’t like I was writing a masterpiece, it was just a diary, so why was it so hard? I couldn’t express the ecstasy and shame I felt. It was a dirty feeling. Almost all the books I read I did so in Korean language classes. They didn’t have the sentences I needed. So I started to write poetry.

It was a mistake.

The poetry teacher at the culture centre was a male poet about my age. In our first lesson, he said this with a solemn expression on his face and made me laugh.

“A poet’s is an existence of catching words like a skilled killer and finally murdering them.”

By then, I’d already gone hunting, “caught and killed” dozens of people and buried them in the ground. But I didn’t think of what I had done as poetry. Murder is closer to prose than poetry. Anyone could understand it if they tried. Murder is a more troublesome and foul job than you would have expected.

Whatever the case, it’s true that thanks to that teacher, I gained an interest in poetry. I developed it so as not to feel sad, but I responded with humour.

*

I’m reading the Diamond Sutra.

“Let your mind wander freely without abiding anywhere or in anything”

*

I went to poetry classes quite a long time ago. I was going to kill him if the lecture was a disappointment, but fortunately it was rather interesting. The teacher made me laugh several times and he even praised my poems twice. So I let him live. He must have been living since then, unaware that he was given those additional years. I read his latest anthology a while ago and it was disappointing. Should I have just buried him then?

I wonder if there’s another genius murderer like me, who has stopped killing, but still writes such accomplished poetry. How audacious.

*

I’m falling over a lot these days. I fall over riding my bike and I fall over stones on the road. I’ve forgotten a lot. I put the kettle on about three times. Eunhui phoned to say she’d picked up my prescription from the hospital. I got angry and yelled at her; Eunhui was silent for a while, then she said,

“Something’s definitely wrong. It’s obvious something’s happened to your head. It’s the first time I’ve heard you angry, dad.”

Have I really never been angry before? Eunhui hung up first while I stood there blankly. I grabbed the phone to continue the unfinished conversation but I suddenly couldn’t recall how to phone her. Do you press the call button first? Or do you press the numbers first and then the call button? But what’s Eunhui’s number? No, I’m sure it was something simpler than that.

It was frustrating. It was irritating. I flung the phone across the room.

*

I didn’t know much about poetry so I just wrote honestly about my murders. ‘Knife and bone’ – was that the title of my first poem? The teacher said my poems were unique. He said the raw words and my imaginings of death sharply portrayed the meaninglessness of life. He repeatedly commented on my metaphors.

“What’s a ‘metaphor’?”

The teacher laughed – I didn’t like that laugh – and explained what a ‘metaphor’ was. It’s what we call ‘biyu’ in Korean.

Aha.

I’m sorry, but those weren’t metaphors.

*

I’m holding the Diamond Sutra in my hands. I’ve spread it open to read.

“Inside the air, there’s no substance, no feeling, thought, will or consciousness, no eyes, ears, noses, tongues, bodies or meaning, no shapes or sounds, smells, tastes, touch or awareness, no limit to eyes, no limit to consciousness, no unknowns yet endless unknowns, no old age and death yet endless old age and death, no pain, or causes for pain, or loss of pain, or ways to get rid of pain, no wisdom, and no receipt.”

*

Have you really never learned poetry before?” The teacher asked.

“Should I learn?” I asked back.

“No. If you learn wrong, you’ll end up throwing away your style instead,” he replied. I said to him,

“Ah, I see. That’s lucky. There must be lots of other things in life you can’t teach.”

*

I had an MRI. I lay down on an examination table that looked like a white coffin. I went into the light. It was like a kind of near death experience. I saw an illusion floating in the air, looking down on me. Death is right beside me. I can tell. I’m going to die soon.

One week later, I did some kind of cognitive test. The doctor asked and I answered. The questions were simple but the answers were difficult. It felt like having to scoop out a fish from a water tank and it suddenly disappearing the moment you grab it. Who is the president? What year is it? Please say three of the words you just heard. What is 17 plus 5? I’m sure I know the answer. But it just doesn’t come to mind. I know but I don’t? Does such a thing happen in the world?

I finished the test and met with the doctor. His expression was hardly cheerful.

“It’s shrinking year by year.”

He pointed at the picture of my brain taken by the MRI.

“It’s definitely Alzheimer’s. We’re not yet certain what stage you’re at. It will take some time to find out.”

Eunhui sat next to me with her lips pursed together, not uttering a word. The doctor said,

“Your memories will gradually disappear. Your short-term and most recent memories will go. We can slow the progress but we can’t stop it. Firstly, please make sure you take your prescription as stated. Write things down and keep them on you. You might be unable to find your own house later on.”

*

Essays of Montaigne. I’m re-reading the yellowed paperback. I like this passage all over again, reading it now I’ve aged.

“We’re ruining our lives with our fear of death and we’re spoiling our deaths with our concerns about life.”

*

On our way back from the hospital, there was an inspection. The policeman recognised us when he looked at our faces, so he just let us go on. He was the youngest son of the union president.

“We’re doing an inspection because of the murder. We’ve been doing it day and night for several days and it’s killing me. Would a murderer really do as he pleases and go back in broad daylight?”

He said that in ours and the neighbouring province, three women have died one after the other. The police have concluded that it’s a serial killer. All three women were in their twenties and on their way home. Their wrists and angles were bound. Since the third victim appeared right after I was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, it was only natural that I questioned myself.

Was it me?

I looked at the calendar hanging on the wall and picked out the assumed dates of the women’s kidnappings and murders. I had an unquestionable alibi. It was a relief that it wasn’t me but it’s not good that someone who randomly kidnaps and kills women has appeared in my area. I reminded Eunhui about the murderer who could be loitering nearby. I told her to take precautions. Never go out alone late at night. You’re finished the moment you get into a man’s car. It’s dangerous to walk wearing earphones.

“Don’t worry so much.” As she went out the door she added, “It’s only murder.”

*

These days, I’m writing down anything I can. There have been times when I’ve come to my senses all confused in places I don’t know and have only got home thanks to my name tag and address hanging around my neck. Last week, some people took me to the police box. The policeman greeted me with a smile.

“I see you’re back, sir.”

“You know me?”

“Of course. I know you well. I know you better than you know yourself.”

Really?

“Your daughter will be here soon. We’ve already phoned her.”

*

Eunhui graduated from the college of agriculture and got a job in a nearby lab. She develops plant species there. She even grafts two different types of plant together to make a new one. Wearing her white lab coat, she practically spends the whole day at the lab; sometimes she even works through the night. Plants have no concern over human commuting hours. I think she sometimes has to fertilise them in the middle of the night. They grow shamelessly, brazenly.

People think Eunhui’s my granddaughter. They’re shocked when I say she’s my daughter. It’s because I turned seventy this year, but Eunhui’s only twenty-eight. Of course, the person most interested in this mystery was Eunhui. When she was sixteen, she was learning about blood in school. I’m type AB but Eunhui’s type O. They’re blood types that can’t appear between parent and child.

“How am I your daughter?”

Where possible, I do my best to speak honestly.

“I adopted you.”

It must have been from then that Eunhui grew further away from me. She seemed awkward, not knowing how to act around me, and the gap between us widened. From that day onwards, the closeness between Eunhui and I disappeared.

There’s something called Capgras Syndrome. It’s an illness that develops when an abnormality occurs in the area of the brain in charge of feeling intimacy. If you get this illness, you will recognise those close to you, but you will no longer feel the intimacy. For instance, a husband will suddenly suspect his wife. “You’ve got my wife’s face and you act like her, but who the hell are you? Who told you to do this?” They have the exact same face and they do the exact same things, but even so, they feel like a stranger. They just seem unfamiliar. In the end, the patient has no choice but to live on, feeling as though they’ve been exiled to an alien world. They believe that those other people with the same faces are hiding their true selves.

From that day onwards, Eunhui started to treat this small world surrounding her, this family made up of just her and me, with unfamiliarity. Even so, we lived together.

*

The bamboo grove out back rustles when the wind blows. I start to feel dizzy accordingly. On days when the wind rages, even the birds seem to keep quiet.

I bought up the woods with the bamboo grove a while ago. I have no regrets about that purchase. I always wanted my own forest. I go for walks there in the mornings. You can’t run in the bamboo grove. You could die if you fall. The roots remain after you cut down the bamboo and they’re extremely sharp and hard. So in the bamboo grove, you have to walk looking down. As I listen to the sound of the leaves crunching beneath my feet, I think about the bodies buried beneath. The corpses that shoot up towards the sky as bamboo.

*

A young Eunhui asked.

“Then where are my real parents? Are they alive?”

“They’re both dead. I got you from an orphanage.”

Eunhui wouldn’t believe me. She searched alone on the internet and even went to the council, but then locked herself in her room for days. Then she accepted it.

“Did you know my real parents?”

“I met them but we weren’t that close.”

“What were they like? Were they good people?”

“They were. They thought of you up until their last moments.”

*

I’m frying tofu. I eat tofu for breakfast, tofu for lunch, tofu for dinner. I pour oil in the pan and put in the tofu. Once it’s cooked enough I turn it over. I eat it with kimchi. No matter how severe my dementia gets, I’ll be able to make this on my own. My tofu meal.

*

The minor collision was the start. It was at a three-way intersection and the guy’s jeep was in front of me. Recently, I’ve been losing my sight on a daily basis. It must be the Alzheimer’s. For a moment, I couldn’t see the guy’s stationary car and I crashed into the back of it. It was a jeep customised for hunting. The search lights on the roof weren’t enough; there were three more footlights above the bumper. These cars are customised so it’s possible to hose down the boot. There were two batteries. In the hunting season, these guys always flock to the mountain behind the town.

I got out of the car and approached the jeep. He didn’t get out. Even the window was closed. I knocked on the window.

“Hello, can you come out?”

He nodded and motioned me to just go. It was strange. Shouldn’t he at least look at the rear bumper? I didn’t budge and eventually he got out. He was in his early thirties and of a sturdy build; he looked at the rear bumper absentmindedly and said it was fine. It wasn’t fine. The bumper was caved in.

“Just go, mister. It’s always been dented. It’s fine.”

“But just in case, we should exchange contact details. You don’t want to regret it later.”

I handed over my contact details. He wouldn’t take it.

“I don’t need it.” He spoke in an emotionlessly cold tone.

“Do you live nearby?”

He didn’t answer. Instead, he stared straight into my eyes. They were like snake eyes. They were cold and cruel. I was certain. We recognised each other then.

He wrote down his name and number on a piece of notepaper. It was child-like writing. His name was Park Ju Tae. I returned to the back of the jeep to double-check the damage. It was then that I saw it. The drops of blood dripping out of the boot. And I felt it. His eyes on me as I looked at the dripping blood.

If blood spills out of a hunting jeep, people will assume there’s a dead deer or something inside. I started to suspect that it was a human corpse. It was safer that way.

*

Who was it? A Spanish, no an Argentinian writer. I can’t remember the author’s name now. Anyway, there was this story in someone’s novel. An old writer met a young man while walking along the riverside and they started talking on a bench. He realised later. That young man he met at the riverside was himself. If I were to meet my younger self like that, would I recognise him?

*

Eunhui’s mum was my final sacrifice. On the way back after burying her in the ground, my car crashed into a tree and overturned. The police said I was speeding and lost balance on the curve. I had a second brain operation. At first I thought it was because of the medicine. I was lying in the hospital room but my mind continued to feel peaceful and strange. Before, I would feel unbearably irate whenever people made noise. The sound of people ordering food, the sound of children laughing, the sound of women chattering. I hated it all. But a peace suddenly came over me. I thought it was normal to have an endlessly racing mind. It wasn’t. Like someone who had suddenly gone deaf, I had to get used to this abrupt silence and serenity that had come over me. Whether it was because of the shock from the accident, or the doctor’s scalpel, something happened to my brain.

*

Words are gradually vanishing. My head’s turning into a sea cucumber. It’s full of holes. It’s slippery. Everything’s escaping. In the morning, I read the whole newspaper from start to finish. When I’ve finished reading, it feels like I’ve forgotten more than I’ve read. I read, even so. Whenever I read sentences, it feels like I’m being forced to assemble a machine missing several essential parts.

*

I was after Eunhui’s mum for a long time. She was working at the culture centre I used to visit. She had pretty calves. Maybe it was because of all the poetry and sentences, but my heart went weak. It was as though I was suppressing my urges of regret and rumination. I didn’t want to be weak; I didn’t want to suppress the urges crawling inside me. It felt like I was being pushed into a deep, dark cave. I started to want to see if I was still the me I used to know. When I opened my eyes, Eunhui’s mum was right in front of me – coincidence is often the start of misfortune.

So I killed her

But it was so difficult

It was disappointing

A murder with no pleasure at all. Maybe something was already happening to me then. My second brain operation just made me unable to change that.

*

In the morning, I saw an article in the newspaper that said the community was in shock after another murder had taken place. When was this murder? It seemed strange so I looked in my notes; there was a record of the third murder, the one that had occurred before this. Things are slipping my mind more and more these days. Things that I don’t write down are like sand falling through my fingers. I noted down the report of the fourth murder. A twenty-five year old student was discovered dead on a farm road. Her arms and legs were tied and she wasn’t wearing any clothes. This time too, the corpse was abandoned on the road after she had been kidnapped and killed.

*

That guy Park Ju Tae didn’t contact me. I caught sight of him several times, however. It was too frequent to be coincidence. There must be other times when I’ve seen him not noticed him as well. He stalks around my house like a wolf and watches my every move. Whenever I approached to strike up a conversation, he would hide away before I could.

*

Maybe he’s after Eunhui.

*

I’ve restrained myself and let more people live than I’ve killed. “No-one in the world does everything they want.” My father always used to say this. I agree.

*

In the morning, I couldn’t recognise Eunhui. I recognise her now. That’s lucky. The doctor said that Eunhui too would soon vanish from my memory.

“Only my image will remain then.”

I can’t keep on an existence where I know no-one. I’ve made a locket from a picture of Eunhui and I wear it round my neck.

“Even so, it won’t be of any use. Your short-term memories will go, you see,” the doctor said.

*

“Please just let my daughter live,” Eunhui’s mum pleaded through her tears.

“I will. Don’t worry about that.”

I’ve kept my promise up to now. I always hated people who made empty promises. So I did my best not to become such a person. From now on though, it’s going to be a challenge. I’m writing this again so I don’t forget it. I can’t let Eunhui die.

*

Back when I used to go to the culture centre, the teacher did a class with one of Midang’s poems. It was a poem called ‘wife’. On his wedding night, the husband went into the bathroom, leaving his clothes hanging on the door handle, but he thought his wife was too lustful so he ran away. Forty or fifty years later, he came back to that place by chance and his wife was still sitting there, looking the same as on their wedding night. He gave her a slight tap but she turned to ashes and crumbled. The teacher and even the students made a fuss saying it was a really beautiful poem.

I read it as a poem about a husband who murdered his wife on their wedding night and escaped. A young man, a young woman, and a corpse. How else could you read it?

*

My name is Kim Byong Su. I turned seventy this year.

Period of Distrust by Park Kyung-Ni (Part 4)

On a cold day approaching the lunar New Year, the ajumeoni from Galwol-dong came to visit, all wrapped up in a scarf. For some reason, she seemed a little more distracted than usual.

“I came because there’s something I want to discuss with you…but I’m not sure where to start.”

“…?”

She sat down quietly, as though she was uncomfortable bringing up the subject.

“Well…well, here’s the thing. I lent some money to someone but they died. What am I to do?”

Jinyong looked suspiciously at the ajumeoni.

“I didn’t even get a penny’s interest on the money I took in May…”

Seeing Jinyong’s changing expression, the ajumeoni shut her mouth. May was when she came for Jinyong’s gye money. It was also the month the gye ended. It was not just that though. A few months ago, there were several people who would visit her place, acting all friendly, in order to get the gye money.

“How much did you lend?” Jinyong spoke for the first time.

“Five hundred thousand hwan.”

Inside, Jinyong was surprised. She had thought the ajumeoni just used it to cover her debts, so what could this secret payment mean? Jinyong looked coldly at the ajumeoni. The ajumeoni spoke with tears in her eyes.

“With no kids and no husband, that was all I had left. It doesn’t bear thinking about how much I’ve lost. I thought if all went well I could pay off my debts, but when I gave away that money, I doomed myself.”

Jinyong wanted to corner her, asking where this business that spent the capitol was.

The ajumeoni briefly wiped her tears away and started to explain the details. The dead person was an executive director at the company which used her money, but she had not seen a single penny of interest on the five hundred thousand hwan she lent in May. She grew uneasy so pestered the executive director to withdraw the money, but he did not. At her wit’s end, she consulted a fellow Christian, and left it to her husband, Mr Kim, who said he would look into it. This Mr Kim’s methods were unusual, but he finally received a bank draft from the company president but a few days later, the executive director died in a traffic accident. The fact that he had received this bank draft from the president was most fortunate, but for some reason, this Mr Kim did not hand it over and she was not sure if he had defrauded her or not. But even if she was suspicious of him or found it hard to bear, the person to whom she gave the money was now dead and there was no way she, as a woman, could get the money off this president. She beat her breast in frustration.

Once she had heard everything, Jinyong said,

“How on earth did you know this man to give him the money?”

“Well, you know Sangbae right? He’s Sangbae’s dad.”

“What? Sangbae, that student who got christened?”

The ajumeoni blushed. Jinyong grew irritated. She recalled her saying that Sangbae’s father would be going to Seoul for business.

“So he was just using religion.”

The ajumeoni looked down as if blinded by Jinyong’s eyes.

“I don’t know, now I think about it, everything seems pre-planned. Even getting christened…”

“Is there a stronger guarantee of credibility than religion?”

The ajumeoni grew dejected at Jinyong’s sarcasm. Jinyong averted her eyes from the dejected ajumeoni.

This ajumeoni who trusted and gave away her money because of a christening, who trusted and left someone to sort her money because they were a Christian, you could only say that she was simple. Thinking as such, Jinyong looked at her again. Her desire to interrogate the ajumeoni about her weak point had already disappeared.

 “So what do you plan to do?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking you.”

“I think it would be good if Mr Kim takes care of business and you take the bank draft.”

“But what if he doesn’t take care of it, and doesn’t visit me?”

“Then you’ll see he had an entirely different ambition.”

“Then if he doesn’t take care of it, can you help me out? I think you’ll easily see him if you’re just one woman,” she pleaded.

“I don’t know.”

She hated that kind of thing. But after discovering her weakness, rejecting her seemed fiendish, so she said with an apathetic expression,

“We’ll go together.”

Then her mother, ignorant of all this, walked in with the lunch. The ajumeoni chatted away as she ate her lunch, seemingly much relieved.

“I guess even if you have money it’s a problem. You’re scared at first and don’t think of other people.”

Jinyong swallowed her food expressionlessly.

“Don’t say anything, just find the money and do the business…your honour or whatever doesn’t matter…I’d like to get some capitol too.”

“You just need to find a job.”

“Is it that easy? If I can’t, I should just sell bread on the street.”

“You studied so much, there’s no way you won’t get one if you try. I guess I should do business. But a gye’s best for earning money. It’s not even hard work…” she said, putting her spoon down and picking her teeth with a matchstick.

Of course you think like that, such a nerve. Jinyong looked into the ajumeoni’s eyes. They were clear, without a trace of evil.

“In any case, you’ve got to make money. Money’s the best. In the world…” Unawares, her tone this time sounded frustrated and repulsed by the deed she had committed.

“Then, as the saying goes, although you’ll be hungry if you outlive your children, you’ll be confident if you have money,” the mother agreed enthusiastically.

Jinyong felt a light dizziness. She quickly turned away as if to erase their faces from her sight.

“Will I go to heaven like this? Money, money, ha ha,” the ajumeoni burst out laughing, got up and put on her gloves.

Jinyong felt that again, there was an unease and despair hidden in that laugh. She raised her head and looked at her. As expected, she was a pained, lonely woman.

After the ajumeoni left, Jinyong collapsed on her bedding. Her body was untangled like cotton.

She was certain that the gas from the heater burning in the room was leaking out. If the gas fills the room, I’ll die.

Before she knew it, she had fallen into a painful sleep.

The boy soldier with the burst guts appeared in her dream. She tried and tried to wake herself from it.

“It’s a holiday the day after tomorrow so I’ll have to send a thousand hwan to the temple…” She could faintly hear her mother talking. She raised herself up and opened her eyes.

“Ghosts and humans, they’re the same…others eating their share and my Munsu biting his fingers, waiting for his mum.”

Having completely awoken, Jinyong jumped out of bed. She took her coat and scarf, walked out of the room and put them on.

In the kitchen, she put a box of matches in her coat pocket, and then she left the house.

She had decided to finally do today what she had wanted to do in her heart for a long time.

She walked along the uphill road covered in bright snow. She felt her hair stand on end like a hedgehog.

Her scarf and coat skirt fluttered in the wind. The snow sitting on the treetops flew down onto her coat collar.

Jinyong walked on mechanically.

When she entered the temple courtyard, the old monk who had said, “just like you, monks need to eat to live,” was coming out of the nunnery. The temple was still, with no other signs of life.

Whilst aware that the muscles in her face were convulsing, she approached the monk.

“I, here’s the thing. We’re going to the country this time, and I want to take my child’s picture and tablet.” She spoke softly with her head bowed. The monk looked at her with snow-white eyes, then said as if recalling something,

“Are you moving? Then what am I meant to do? Just leave it. You don’t want to forget it in the holiday post.”

She jerked up her lowered head and turned to him.

“There’s nothing to interfere. Give me the picture, quickly,” she snapped. The monk looked puzzled and muttered something to himself as he entered the sanctuary.

When the monk finally came out with Munsu’s picture and tablet, Jinyong snatched them and walked out the gate without a word of parting.

The angered monk watched her leave, then walked back, muttering to himself.

Jinyong was not angry at the monk. She just wanted to get the picture and leave the temple as quickly as possible.

Jinyong returned to the road and climbed up the hill. As she walked, she peeked here and there. Once she arrived at a dry, snowless lawn behind a large rock, she flopped down on it. Then she took Munsu’s picture and tablet and gazed at them for a moment.

A short while later, she took a match out of her pocket and lit the photo. She then threw the tablet into the flames. But rather than the picture burning, the flames subsided. She took a tissue out of her pocket and tore it on top of the picture. It started to burn again.

The picture was completely burned. The yellow smoke was starting to thin out. Jinyong watched as the smoke disappeared into the wind.

“I only have painful memories left. Only memories of your cruel death.”

Two tracks of tears ran down her still face.

The winter sky was heartlessly clear. The snow resting on the treetops flew down with the wind onto her coat collar.

“That’s right, I’ve still got life left in me. A life that can resist,” she muttered as she grabbed onto the tree and went down the snowy slope.