Interviewer's introduction: “She stands head to head with me, her back slightly bent. She must have been quite tall and slender in her youth. Her hair is gray with occasional black strands, cut in a neat but simple boy's cut and parted to the side. Her eyes behind gold wire framed glasses are slit low, so that they almost close when she smiles a broad generous smile, which never elevates to a full laugh. It is a smile that disappears fast before it even reaches her eyes.

`My name? I only use one name and that is the name I was given at birth. Mmmm ... Kang Yang-Ok. I'm eighty-nine years old. I was born on June 29, 1910, in Chejudo [an island to the southwest of the Korean peninsula], Choch’ŏn-myŏn, Shinchŏn.

I have no brother or sister. There is only me. When my mother had me in her stomach, she and my father separated. Although they parted, she couldn't erase me. My mother gave birth to me alone. They said my father died when I was three years old. This is the reason why I don't have any siblings. My mother never ever talked about my father or what happened between them. Mmm.. . . My mother never talked about that with me. Sometimes, I used to think about why my parents separated....

My mother married when she was eighteen years old. After she married, for about two years she went back and forth from my father's house to her ch'inch?ng. During one of those times she got pregnant with me. Then she found out my father was living with another woman. I guess that is the reason why my mother separated from him. So I was raised in the oeka (mother's natal household). That was why I never knew any of my father's relatives and know nothing about his ancestors. My oe-halmang (maternal grandmother) and oe-harabang (maternal grandfather) raised me since I was a baby.

When I was fifteen years old, my mother came to Japan alone. I stayed behind with my grandparents. There were many rumors floating around about how easy it was to make money in Japan. That's why my mother decided to come to Japan. At that time you had to have a permit. A parent, a relative, or a spouse in Japan could send you the entry permit. A very good friend of my mother who lived here for quite a while sent her the permit. My mother worked on a farm in the countryside somewhere near Hirano in Ōsaka.

My oe-halmang and oe-harabang were farmers. In Chejudo, there were farming villages, and villages where the people went out to sea to dive for seaweed, abalone, and shells. In the village where I grew up, farming was the main source of survival. We harvested wheat and barley, and ploughed the fields. After my grandparents passed away we didn't farm anymore. There was no one to do it. In Chejudo there were two very important things for farming—your own bull and your man to turn the dirt in the fields and plow it. My mother didn't have any siblings, just like me. My mother was alone, and I was alone.... When my oe-halmang and oe-harabang passed away, my mother and I only had each other. Even if you tried to hire someone to work the land for you, it wouldn't work. So those families that did not have enough hands to work the land couldn't farm, and had to find other ways to feed themselves. I remember when I was fifteen years old, during that year, we didn't have much success in farming. That year it wasn't just us. Basically all over Chejudo farming was quite unsuccessful. So all the people, unless they were extremely rich, went hungry. Nothing would grow that year. We used to pull ssuk (sagebrush) and then boil it to eat. We mixed it up with other edible grasses and ate it. There were times like that....

After my mother passed away when she was seventy years old, a relative from my mother's shika came to see me from Seoul and wanted the rights to hold the chesa ceremony for her. So her chesa ceremony was held by one of my father's relatives. Although my mother separated from my father, she never remarried. She lived with me until she died, depending on me, her only child. Believing only in me....

My harabang passed away when he was sixty-four years old. My halmang passed away when she was eighty-eight. I was thirteen years old when my harabang passed away, and I was in my thirties when my halmang passed away. Our relatives took care of their funerals and chesa. But these days, I don't think that they do any of their chesa ceremonies. If they were still holding the chesa [mourning ritual], they would at least write to me once a year, but there have been no letters for a long, long time. So I guess the chesa for my grandparents has long been forgotten....

My grandparents were really good people. They didn't have much, though ... not many children, nor much money, or many relatives. But they tried to lead good, honest, hardworking lives. I was very close to them. My favorite person in the world was my halmang. I used to sleep in the same room with her. Sometimes during winter, when I used to lie next to her and my feet felt really cold, my halmang would take off her vest and wrap it around my feet very tightly and then massage my feet and say softly, "pal shiri chi ... (your feet must be cold)." I grew up in my halmang's hands. That is why even now at this age when I close my eyes, I can still see my halmang. We didn't have much, but she raised me with so much love. When I think about my past and the people of my past, the first person who comes to my mind is my halmang. Then, I think about my mother. She and I, we survived through her sheer strength.... So l guess until I die, and I have breathed my final breath.... When my lifeline is cut and I can no longer breathe.... Until then, the only thoughts that come to my mind are of my halmang and my mother ... the only people who really loved me.

As a child, I never knew what studying and school meant.... Maybe that was the reason why I do not know the ways of the world. In my world there were only my grandmother and my mother. After my grandmother passed away, it was just me and my mother. I lived for my mother and my mother lived for me. So that was how we came to live all of our lives together ... always. Even when I was married and I had a husband, it was just the same as if I didn't have one. He was a gambler and could never find a job.... Aigu ... (she sighs). I married when I was fifteen [1925, when her mother was living in Japan]. One of my neighbors brought me and my husband together. My husband-to-be was living in Japan. My neighbor said that he was from a really good family and was a very good man. She said if I were to agree to the marriage, it would definitely be to my advantage. My grandparents gave permission for me to marry. I didn't know what he looked like or what kind of person he was—whether he was good-looking or bad-looking. I didn't know anything about him, but I had to marry him. We were four years apart in age. He was also from Chejudo, and his kohyang [place of birth] was a faraway village. He was living in Japan, and so it meant that I would have to leave my halmang in Chejudo. The neighbor who introduced me to my husband said what a wonderful man he was and what a good family he was from. So I guess although my grandmother didn't want me to move all the way to Japan, all she had in her mind was that I, her only grandchild, would be able to marry well.

I came to Japan when I was sixteen years [1926] old. My husband returned to Japan a month after we got married in Chejudo. I stayed behind for a year. I came to Japan alone on a boat to Ōsaka from Chejudo. I left my halmang behind. From the first day of our married life in Japan, I lived with a husband who gambled for a living and did nothing else. A big-time gambler! I heard he started gambling when he was quite young. You know in Japan, then and now, there is no way to live in this country without your own money. But all he did was gamble. He never worked. Gambling was his job. We had to pay the rent, two yen and fifty sen, but no matter how cheap the rent was, we couldn't pay it. We had to live somehow ... but how? I couldn't take it any more. I went back to my kohyang. My mother continued to live in Japan.

I went back to Chejudo when I was seventeen years old. But as months passed, my stomach got bigger and bigger. I had absolutely no idea that I was pregnant. Although I soon turned eighteen, I had no idea of these things. One day one of my friends said, "You could be pregnant." I didn't know anything.... All I knew was that my stomach was getting bigger and bigger.... Ahh.... Then, I had a baby. Ha, ha . . . (she laughs quietly).

I had the bright red thing coming out for the first time when I was fourteen years old. It really shocked me terribly. I thought, maybe I had a disease, because I was bleeding so much. Nothing hurt, but I continued to bleed. You know, back then you wore thin underpants under your skirt, and one day it had blood on it. Finally, I went to my mother and I told her that nothing hurt but I was continuing to bleed. My mother said my body was coming of age. She brought out a piece of cloth and showed me how to make it into something that looked like a diaper.

Well, so I had my first child in my ch'inchŏng. My mother stayed in Japan. My halmang was with me when I was having the child. She had seven children of her own, but they all died except for my mother. She was the only one who survived. My halmang was so happy. "Aigu ... aigu.. . . I'm so happy, I'm so happy." Ai ... (she sighs). In Chejudo the women work, and we work hard until it gets quite dark. That night when I was to give birth, I worked until about midnight, weaving these things we call yangt'ae [brim of a Korean man’s traditional black hat]. I decided to go to sleep and got under my blanket. Suddenly, I felt like I wanted to go to the bathroom to urinate. Then when I squatted to urinate, my stomach started hurting all of a sudden. When I went back into the room, my stomach hurt more and more. "Halmang, halmang, my stomach is sore ... halmang." I called out to my grandmother who was sleeping next to me. She woke up with a start, and then told me to lie down. She started rubbing my stomach. "Aigu, your body is splitting," my halmang whispered quietly to herself. I thought, "My body is splitting? What is that supposed to mean?" I was feeling very afraid, but still I remember wondering how my body could split. I know now that she was saying that the baby was going to come out. I didn't have such a hard time having the baby. I just put a little pressure down there and then when I pushed down on my stomach, the baby soon came out. "Aigu, it's a boy, it's a boy," my grandmother said happily. "It's a boy. . . ." (She whispers.)

I had the baby when I was eighteen years old, but it was like a baby having a baby. I was eighteen but I didn't know anything.... I didn't know how to mother a child. I still felt like a child myself. A woman has a baby, and she has to take care of it, but I didn't know any of that. My stomach hurt, and then the baby came out, and when the baby came out my stomach didn't hurt anymore.... That was all that I could think of. . . . There was no feeling like it was my baby and that I was the mother of this child.... None of that. My grandmother brought out the blanket and told me to lie down, and I did as she told me. I just lay there and watched my grandmother give the baby a bath and wash him. When I looked at the baby, it was so tiny, but aigu, the baby looked so ugly. I didn't want to even look at it. I don't know why, but every time I looked at the baby, I would think, how did this thing come out of me....

My grandmother would bring the baby for me to breast-feed it. She would bring it up to my breasts. My breasts were swollen out to here, leaking milk, but I didn't want the baby to come near me or suckle on my breasts. To me it looked so ugly.... I didn't want to even look at it. About two months later, the baby fell ill. It cried all day and started having clear bubble-like diarrhea. That put my grandmother into a panic, "This is terrible, this is terrible. Maybe the baby has a cold. Put the baby up to your breast and see if it will suckle," she said. So right away, I brought the baby up to me, but this time the baby refused to suck on my breast. The baby continued to cry and we had no idea what was wrong with him. Finally, my grandmother went to call an old lady in the neighborhood who sat by the baby and said prayer-chants. And believe it or not, the baby got better soon after that. We didn't have any medicine to feed him, and there weren't any doctors, but after the old woman sat and recited her chants in front of the baby, the baby recovered. The baby began to suckle on my breasts and became quite strong after that, and you know, that child up to now has never gotten sick after that one time. I don't know what the old lady prayed or chanted. She was very, very old, and she walked half bent. She sat down and said something like "moshin, moshin, moshin. . . ." I don't know what she said, but since that one time when we thought he was going to die for sure, he has been the healthiest.

After I gave birth to my first child, my mother called me back to Japan. I told her that I didn't want to go. But she said that my husband had changed and he was working.... She said it would be better for me to live in Japan. So, finally, unable to go against my mother's wishes, I came back to Japan. For a few months I thought maybe he had changed. But soon he quit his job and was gambling full time again.... Even now when I see a person who gambles, ch'ika ttŏlryŏ – it makes me shake with disgust. But I must say that although he was obsessed with gambling, he wasn't a bad man. He had a good heart. The only problem was that he didn't want to work, and all he could see before his eyes was gambling. But no matter how much I complained about his gambling, he never laid a hand on me. He was a quiet and gentle person, but gambling was his disease. He lost everything ... so much money ... money that we didn't have. ... But we didn't live with each other for very long. He died when he was thirty years old. His parents were living in his kohyang and he had a few siblings, but they all died quite early. My husband was a lover of gambling and hater of work, and I guess his life span went as fast as the lifestyle he led.

When you marry for the first time and things don't work out, then you should just learn to live alone. If you think that by marrying once again you will somehow be happy, it doesn't work like that. I remarried when I was I think twenty-eight or twenty-nine. With my first husband I had two children, and with my second husband I didn't have any [one of her daughters said that her mother had four children; perhaps two died]. We lived together for a while, and then one day he just picked up and left. Soon my thirties passed and then my forties ... saaaaa ... (she lets out a deep sigh).

I had to feed my kids and send them to school, jyaaa. . . (she sighs) ... all I could think about was how I was going to survive. The only kind of work that I could do was sewing and tailoring. Since coming to Japan, I have never worked outside of the home in factories and such. I would receive the work from the factories and do naishoku (work at home) [Japanese word]. People told me about jobs here and there in factories, but what kind of work could I do? ... I didn't know how to speak, and I had no other skills. The only thing I knew how to do was sew. Then a couple of my friends told me that I should try to work for "our people" instead of being stuck in the house. I didn't know how to speak very well, and I was not educated. I thought what could a person like me do to help our people have a better living environment and society. But believe it or not, I have come to work for our Chongryun for about forty years now.

Right now it is called Chongryun [short for the General Federation of Korean Residents in Japan, a pro-North Korea organization] but back then, right after the war it was called Ryŏngmeng. The first chojik (organization) for the Chosŏn people was called Ryŏngmeng. Then the Japanese government dissolved Ryŏngmeng and didn't allow us to continue working in our organization. I think it was 1953 that Chongryun was again established as our chojik [actually, May 1955]. So that was how I started working for the Jo-Chongryun (women's group) going from one neighborhood to another telling this person and that person, anyone who would listen, about the new Chongryun organization. It was part of my daily activity and I didn't see it as work. So I guess that is the reason why there was never a limit, or a feeling that I should just do this much or that much for the day. There was no limit to how many more people I could tell about the Chongryun organization. Aigu ... (she sighs).

Whenever the organization was building schools or doing something to benefit our people living in Japan, I tried my best to help. I could not contribute much money, so I gave all I had of my body, my strength, my ability to work and move about. For example, to build schools for the children--you know for the second generation, it was the first time that we were able to educate them in our own schools. We couldn't continue to borrow people's houses to educate the children. In order to plan for a school, we needed land, money, donations, contributions, and so many other complicated things. I guess when you start there is nothing too hard to accomplish, but it was a hard road, to build schools, offices.... Of course with money we were able to build and get everything going, but what we most needed were people and everyone's strength. There was no way to get these things done with only one or two people.

In southern Chosŏn [Korea], every several years they changed leaders and each time the country went through a lot of changes. But our Kim II-Sung Changgun-nim (General) is always the same. Whether we Koreans are in Japan, or America, or India or wherever ... his guidance and leadership is always the same and never changes. We Chosŏn saram (Koreans) live in Japan, but if it wasn't for our Changgun-nim we wouldn't be able to live here so comfortably. The Japanese have taken us Chosŏn saram from our countries and brought us to Japan by force, making us work, and even killing us.

We endured so much kosaeng [hardships] being pushed around here and there, and basically they have taken our country away from us ... the Japanese. But after independence from Japan, we reclaimed our country, and our Changgun-nim made sure that we Chosŏn saram who were living in Japan were protected and allowed to live comfortably. So that's why our Chongryun was organized and our leader in the central office is able to provide good guidance and leadership. That is why we can live so freely here in Japan, and this is all due to our Kim Il-Sung Changgun-nim. There isn't one bad thing that he has allowed to happen to us ... not one bad thing.... He has always protected our livelihood here in Japan, and he has never turned us away. Our Changgun-nim has accepted all of us no matter who we are, and he has done everything that he could possibly do to establish our organization here in Japan. So that's why not even the Japanese government can touch our Chongryun organization.

In the beginning there was Ryŏngmeng, which the Japanese government dissolved, to make sure that we couldn't build our own schools and such, and in the midst of all of that confusion, Mindan came about. The Mindan organization became a separate organization, but I have continued to be on the Chongryun side. I have never walked another path. All of my children attended Chongryun schools throughout. They didn't go all the way up to the Chosŏn University, but they all attended Chongryun schools. Our children were born and raised in Japan, but because of our schools and our education, no matter where they go they can express themselves perfectly in their own Chosŏn language.

For me, living alone with my children—I received a lot of help from Chongryun. If I didn't know of Chongryun and had to do everything by myself, I am sure that I would have had to endure more kosaeng than I have had—I would have suffered a lot more for sure.... You know, I do not know how to read or write, and I certainly can't speak very well, but I do have ears and so I was able to at least listen, and out of a hundred things, I was able to pick out at least one of his words and then get it into my head. And no matter what kind of a time I was facing, I was able to think about his words. This is what I think is faith. Through this belief you are able to lead your life the best way, and make up for the things that you don't have. My belief in Kim Il-Sung Changgun-nim has given me more strength than a husband, my parents, or anything else.... If I walk this path then it is the right path, and it is the most comfortable, safe, and only path to follow until the end. Now I am too old and I can't move around so much, so I stay in my room most of the time. But whenever I sit, I always think, "Aigu, our Changgun-nim has left us and the world. . . . If he were to be living now everything would still be good. . . . He has finally left this world [July 1994}. . . ." All the other things ... even my own children ... never mind all of that ... when Changgun-nim was living I believed that I could live in peace for the rest of my life. That was the only way I could think and that was all that I knew....”

I have tried many things, but there has never been anything that worked. I guess the fact that I am able to feel like this for Kim Il-Sung Changgun-nim has been a part of my fate ... my destiny. When our Kim Il-Sung Changgun-nim passed away and I heard the news, (6) I received such a shock, and that is the reason why my health became this weak. In the morning I got up and then I received a phone call, and on the other line, before I could say hello, was a woman's voice wailing saying, "Our Kim II-Sung Changgun-nim has passed away, turn on the TV!" So without saying anything, I hung up the phone, rushed to the TV, and I turned it on. There it was ... the news of his death. I stood there in my nightgown and I didn't know what to do. I tried to change into regular clothes, but I couldn't control the trembling of my whole body.... I can't put it into words.... Aigu. . . . My body was shaking and fluttering all on its own. I thought, "Aigu ... did somebody kill him? We didn't hear anything about him falling ill or anything that was wrong with his health.... How did he end up dying and leaving us like this?" I ran as fast as I could to the Chongryun office, and as soon as I walked in, all I could hear was the "Wong, wong . . ." (crying) of so many people's voices. For me when our Changgun-nim passed away, it hurt me more than when my own mother passed away. After she passed away, I thought to myself that my mother has finally left this world.... But when the Changgun-nim passed away, from the very first news that I heard of it on the telephone, I felt completely hopeless.... I felt lost.... You could very well say that I became crazy trying to work out what this was all about. Why did it happen?

Twice I saw the Changgun-nim in a dream. In one of the dreams I saw the rising sun. Just when I looked toward it, I saw our Changgun-nim's face, and it was so very bright and clear. This kind of thing, I have never uttered to another soul, until now ... I dreamt of him like this the year before last year. I saw him twice in my dreams. The second time the Changgun-nim was standing in the middle of a farm giving a speech and guiding the people. He was telling the farmers to plant this and that. I could never forget these dreams.... Aigu ... (she sighs).

If he was alive, then perhaps the talks with South Chosŏn would have been successful, and maybe there would have been a chance at reunification, but.... It was less than a month before he was to attend talks with South Chosŏn. I think that if he had lived four or five years longer, then things would have been better. It seems that they are having such a hard time now. Our North side is not like the South. In the South you dig the land anywhere and plant something, and it will start to grow, but in the North it is not like that. The land and the soil are not so strong. I have been to the North a few times, but the farming is not so good. Things such as potatoes grow very well, but other things don't grow very well at all. When Chosŏn became independent from Japan, many people were going back to their homeland, but I had no friends or family in the North, and that is the reason why I didn't go. But at that time, in the North as well as the South, farming was at its all-time low.

Now, all I wish is for people to be able to go back and forth between the North and the South and be able to talk freely with each other. You know there are people who are separated from their parents and their children and their relatives. It is of secondary importance whether there will be reunification, or that the country become one, but simply that people would be able to meet and talk. That is all that I wish for now. Sometimes I think how my life would have turned out if I had gone to the North during the time when many people were going). But I suppose this is also a part of my destiny, because back then I had absolutely no desire to go to the North. For me when I thought of kohyang, all that came to my mind was Chejudo. No matter how many years I have been in Japan, the Chejudo sat'uli (dialect) I haven't forgotten.

Chejudo is really a beautiful place. Mt. Halla was my favorite place from the time when I was a child. There is a saying that great people are born on Mt. Halla, having great skills and talents. There is a story that said that because great people were born on the mountain, yukchi (mainland) people came to Chejudo and went into the mountain to kill the power of the soil and land. I hear that the hole called "ko-ryang pu" is still there in the mountains. It is said that from this hole there came the three original last names—Ko, Ryang, and Pŭ. People who have these names were thought to be of pure breed from the famous Mt. Halla. This is the story I heard when I was a child.

Near my village there was a big drinking bar. When the paeknyŏn tŭl [derogatory term for Japanese] came to our Chejudo, these Japanese soldiers would go up to a bar on a hill with their high boots to the knees, carrying guns, and wearing these funny-looking caps. They would all rush into the bar. It was quite shocking to see them at first. At that time I didn't even know that our country was being taken away from us. I was too little to know all that was happening. But when I saw them near a field that first time, I thought they were quite scary looking. All the other grown-ups would suddenly stop working in the fields and stand by the road with their heads down. No one would look up. I went to one of my neighbors and said, "Look, the scary-looking people are coming." The woman didn't answer and she kept her head down and didn't dare look up. I was too little to know that these people had eaten up our country.... The adults knew what was going on, but all they could do was stand there with their heads hung low.

In order to get to my house from this big field, I had to go up the hill along a curved road. The road was surrounded by large plots of fields and right in the center I remember that a pole was built and several other poles went up soon after. I didn't know at the time what it was, but it turned out that the soldiers were putting up telephone poles. I don't remember so much about the Japanese in Chejudo, but that sight I have never forgotten. Then, I guess about a year later, I remember that the Japanese soldiers came and told everyone that we must stick a piece of paper written in Chinese characters in front of our houses. Of course, most of us didn't know how to read so we put it up without knowing what it meant. I guess it was something that showed that we were a part of Japan. Then, they came around and told us to put a small flag in front of our house and it was the Japanese flag. They said that from then on this was the flag of our country.

In my neighborhood, there was an old harabang who could speak Japanese. After gathering all the people from our village together, the Japanese put this harabang in front of them and said things, and then this harabang explained to us what they said. He said that we were no longer an independent Chosŏn. We were now part of Japan. From this time on, we should listen carefully and obey what the Japanese soldiers told us to do. If we didn't, they were going to either kill us all or take us to a faraway place. That was when I was quite small, I think about five years old. But I still remember it. Even now I can see it so clearly. I remember standing there thinking, "I wonder where these people are from. They are really scary. We have to listen to what they say otherwise we will get into trouble. . . ." Then, a while later, the soldiers said that because we were no longer Chosŏn, but a part of Japan, if we have pictures of the Chosŏn King (11) on our walls, we must remove them immediately. My harabang and halmang left it on the wall. My neighbor was shocked and told us that if we did not remove the picture we would all be killed. I remember wondering why we would be killed if we didn't take the picture down. My grandmother said, "Aigu, let's take it down. . . ." I thought, "We have to take the picture of the King down, and we have to listen to what these people tell us to do.... What does all of this mean?' Now when I think about it, I am able to connect that time with the facts.... This was the time when the Japanese were swallowing up our country.

Maybe, if I had been a little smarter, I could have thought enough to keep that flag, but now all I have is what I saw and remember. Maybe, I could have listened carefully to what they said or had the grown-ups explain what was going on, but I just remember all the halmang and harabang, standing quietly with their heads down. Maybe they were bowing their heads helplessly knowing that they were losing their country....

When I was thirty-five years old [1945], I packed up everything I had in order to go back to my kohyang [place of birth]. Japan was still at war. There were bombings and explosions and people were taking cover and moving away to escape the bombing. In areas such as Namba or Nishi-nari (districts in Ōsaka) there were many explosions. So many people lost their homes, and the livestock were all lying dead. There were dead cows lying on the road, and people were dead here and there after getting hit by the bombs if they weren't fast enough to make it to the dug-out. They turned black, burned to death. During the war, this kind of thing becomes normal, and you no longer think that this is anything frightening. You get used to it.... At that time, some of my neighbors, who were also people from my kohyang, were all busy packing their bags and saying that they were going home. I packed up everything that I had, too, when Hiroshima got hit by the bomb. People were lying here and there dying or already dead.... I saw it all....

In order to return to my kohyang, I was going to take the ship from Shimonoseki. There were no ships leaving from Ōsaka. So from Shimonoseki, the ship would go to Pusan and from Pusan it would go to Chejudo. Before the trip my mother and I went to Shimonoseki with our luggage and asked when the ship was going to leave. We were told that the ship was going to leave a few days later, and so I came back to Ōsaka alone to take care of the rest of our things. My mother stayed in Shimonoseki and waited for me. In Ōsaka I had to see if there was someone to whom we could rent the house or who could buy the house from us even if it was almost a giveaway. My next-door neighbor said that if no one bought the house, she would look after it for me until we were able to find a buyer. I thought that after I took care of everything, I would be able to leave on the fourth or fifth. So on the fourth, I tried to buy a ticket from Ōsaka, but I couldn't get one. At that time in order to buy a ticket you had to get a permit saying where you were going and why you were going there. That was the only way you were allowed to buy a ticket. So, that put me back a day later until I was able to get the permit saying that I was going to Shimonoseki in order to go back to my kohyang. At the latest I thought I could catch the train on the fifth or sixth and after that I wasn't sure if the trains would be running.

From Ōsaka to Shimonoseki, it took twelve hours by train. Finally, I was able to get on the train on the fifth. But inside the train there was an announcement saying that people going to Shimonoseki had to get off. The train came to a sudden stop a few stations before Hiroshima. I thought to myself that this was strange because the train was supposed to go directly to Shimonoseki. Then there was an announcement saying that we had to get off the train because the bombings were getting heavier and heavier. We were told that those of us who were going on from there to Shimonoseki had to either sleep one night in the train station or walk. I thought, aigu, how can we sleep one night here in the station when we needed to get to Shimonoseki on time to get on the ship. But we stayed there in the train station. There were rumors that no trains would be running. They said there was a big truck to take us, but nobody knew exactly what time the truck was going to show up. That day, the truck didn't show up at all. People started walking and so did I. This was on the seventh, the day after the bombing in Hiroshima. On the seventh we walked. On the eighth we walked. We were so hungry ... if only we could wash our feet, if only we could have some water to drink.... Aigu, ijae pae ttŭnan ti—the ship must have left without us, the ship must have left....

Even though it was the day after the bombing, there were still people lying on the road who had not yet died. I remember so clearly the words [she uses Japanese here] "Mizu kure, mizu kure … (Give me water, give me water ... )" of a man who reached out to me. His body was already dead, just his breathing was left. "Mizu kure, mizu kure . . . ," he begged. But we were told not to give them water, because as soon as they are given water, they die on the spot. Aigu ... aigu ... (she sighs, shaking). Even now when I think about that time in Hiroshima when I saw all those people dead and half-alive ... I just can't get it out of my mind....

Back then, I was wearing wara-zōri (straw sandals). By the time I got to Shimonoseki, my last pair of zōri no longer had a bottom left. Although it was a day after the bomb had been dropped, metal poles were still burning red. To describe the dead people covering the roads.... Ai.... I can't put it into words. ... Ai.. . . I just walked right over their bodies.... The dead people.... I walked right over their bodies.... Aigu.. . . I still have that dead baby in my mind.... I looked up at the train cable, and there it was hanging . . . frozen.... On the road another child with the skin blown off her knee.... My own children were with me.... Aigu.. . . I can't think of that time.... I just can't think of that time.... (She shuts her eyes tightly and shakes her head.)

These days sometimes on TV they have shows about wars here and there, but all of that is nothing compared to that time. I was so hungry. In the midst of all of that ... I was hungry. I still walked on ... but when I couldn't walk any more, I would sit and take a rest, and right next to me would be several bodies. That became normal. Hooo ... (she lets out a deep breath). To be hungry was also becoming a part of me ... like breathing. There was no one to give us food. Whatever little rice ball I brought, I would walk and then stop and eat, and feed my children, and then again, until there was nothing left. Pae kop'a (I was so hungry). You know ... when children are hungry ... they don't breathe very loud.... It's as if they are dead.... My children were so hungry that they had hardly any strength. At night there was no time to rest. There were my two children and two other women from my kohyang. After a while the zōri strap would break and then we would have to walk for a little while barefoot so that we could save our zōri. When I felt the dirt between my toes and on the bottom of my feet, it was still warm. I guess it was left over from the bombing. When I think about that time, I think maybe this year I will be able to forget ... but at night when I lie in the dark and close my eyes, those sights circle, going round and round in front of my eyes. Aigu.. . . Sensō, sensō [Japanese]... (War, war ... ). These days, young people don't have any idea what sensō (war) is about, what chŏn-jaeng (war) is about....

Sometimes when I think of all the people the Japanese and the Americans killed ... it really is scary ... very scary.... Right after the bombing in Hiroshima, there were many fires here and there and even steel poles were bright red from the fires. There were bodies that were black, and all you could see were the whites of their eyeballs. There were people whose bodies were mangled but they were still breathing ... those with arms cut off and legs cut off. . . . Aigu.. . . After the bombing when the bodies were being cleared, people who couldn't move and were barely alive were all lifted and laid together with all the dead bodies. Aigu. . . . Those with their legs cut off and their arms cut off, and were still holding on to their lives, they were laid together quietly with the dead. "Aigu . . . genshi bakudan [Japanese] . . . genshi bakudan—atomic bomb . . . atomic bomb . . ." (she closes her eyes and shakes her head).

In the middle of all of that ... can you believe it ... there was a woman who gave birth to a child.... This woman pushed out the baby and then afterward, she rolled over.... I guess she died.... I don't know. But some of the people around her were looking for things to at least cover the baby. You know in August it's really hot.... The people were covering the baby with some grassy weed.... Aigu. . . "chŏnjaeng, chŏnjaeng ... (war, war ... )." I wondered if this was what war was supposed to mean. I saw the woman lying next to the baby. And you know at that time, I wasn't in the frame of mind to go to her and ask if she needed any help, or if she was okay. I don't know if she was dead or alive, and the baby was squirming ... squirming.... We were sitting there resting and saw all of this ... hooo ... (she breaths out). I thought I would be able to forget what I saw in a few days, and I tried to reassure myself, but for months, whenever I would close my eyes, these sights would haunt me and ... that voice asking for water.... Aigu ... all those dead bodies all stiff and hard ... people lying face down ... babies hanging on the cable lines.... Aigu ... hooo ... (she breathes out). But at that time I didn't think of it as scary.... I just walked over the bodies.... When I felt tired we would sit to take a rest, right next to the bodies. That became nothing unusual.

We'd been walking for three days. We didn't make it in time for the ship ... we lived ... but all we had left was our bodies. On the eighth the ship took off and then sank after an explosion. Everyone aboard died ... all ninety-some people. The ship that I was supposed to be on.... My mother loaded our luggage on to the ship and waited for me and the children. Luckily she didn't get on. We were supposed to be on that ship and if we did make it we would have died along with the rest. It seems that some of my cousin's friends were on the ship. When I heard that all those many people had died, and here I was alive.... Well, I was physically alive, but it was as if I were dead.... I didn't have anything to eat, I didn't have anything to wear, I didn't have anything ... nothing ... except my body and the clothes on my back. I thought back then that although I wasn't living like a human being, because somehow I had survived I had to live. I didn't have anything, but just when I needed something to cover myself, someone came to me with a blanket. When I needed a bowl to eat with, someone brought me a spare bowl and that is how I have come to live and survive up to now.

A few months later, we came back to Ōsaka. My next-door neighbor, who said she would look after the house for me, took it upon herself to sell my house to someone else. When we went back, someone else was living in our house. Ha, ha.... I received a hundred yen for the house. ... (she laughs quietly).

While in Shimonoseki, I saw Americans for the first time. The mikuk-nom tŭl (derogatory word for Americans), when I saw them for the first time, they were all so big, just like their ships. When they marched up like that you could see the frightening glare in their eyes.... Aigu ... (she whispers and shakes her head). The Hiroshima atomic bomb was dropped on August 6, and then independence came on August 15. On that day the now late emperor surrendered and I heard the radio broadcast. I remember seeing the mikuk-nom coming into Japan and I think this was in October. I'm not sure what day it was but anyway it was in October. I was living with my family in Shimonoseki, where we stayed for a few months after missing the ship. One day I was outside, near the port. All of a sudden some Japanese started pushing everyone who was on the street, telling us to move and make way. Suddenly, I heard "whajak-chak, whajak-chak, whajak-chak." It was the sound of the mikuk-nom marching onto Japanese soil, coming in through the Shimonoseki port.

Now these days I wear Western clothing, but back then, I always wore Chosŏn clothes. Most of the Koreans back then used to always wear hanbok. One day in Nakanoshima Park (in Ōsaka), some friends and I, six or seven of us, decided to get together. We were wearing our Chosŏn clothing as usual. On that day, I don't know why, but the mikuk-nom tŭl were everywhere. I think maybe they were having some sort of training or gathering there. They were so scary. My friends and I were shaking. We thought that this was going to be the end of us for sure. We were going to be dead at these mikuk-nom's hands. The soldiers started coming toward us and I guess we were a sight looking so shocked and frightened.... Several of the soldiers were approaching us saying something, and they were waving their hands in front of them and shaking their heads. Now when I think back, I guess they were saying that there was no need to be frightened. But back then I was so afraid of them. I guess the first time when I saw the American soldiers in Shimonoseki, the unforgettable rage in their eyes up close gave me such a terrible shock. I can never forget the sound of their boots marching up the rocky pavement on that day near the Shimonoseki port. The soldiers kept saying, "yang ... yang ... yang ... yang. . ." waving their hands back and forth, and came closer and closer.... I thought this was it. Then, one of the soldiers touched my skirt and tugged at it and said something. Now, when I think back, he was saying, "Korean, Korean. . . ." Then they waved their hands again, smiled, and started moving away. I guess they were telling us good-bye. We all let out a deep sigh of relief and felt so grateful that our lives were spared.

I don't know what you could call it ... kosaeng. . . . I don't know what else you could call it ... or perhaps, p'alcha, your life's destiny.... Sometimes when I sit alone and think about the years that have gone by ... then I really think that everything was according to my own destiny....

You live a lifetime and there are times you live really well and feel happy, and then there are times when you are down on your luck. When you have a balance of these two, then you are able to feel, understand, and explain the ups and downs in your life. But when you live your entire life with only downs then there is nothing more that can be said. P’yong saeng ... (all of my life ... ) all I can remember are difficult times.... But I have no regrets. I know of nothing else but the life that I have led up until now. I was born into this life, and my whole life has been about kosaeng. So I don't have the ability to think that maybe if I were to have done this, then things would have turned out better.... Maybe it is because I am not smart, or I lack the ability to think. I guess I could be too stupid to even be able to regret. I guess when it comes to kosaeng, I have endured as much as I could. I think I have tried to live the right way.... I can't resent my parents, I can't resent anyone, I can't resent my husbands.... When I was created as a human life, I was born into this fate.... What was good, what was bad, who was a good person, who a bad person. . . . I don't think like that.... Now I can only think that I was born into this life and into this fate....

You know, no matter how much my mother suffered, she never let such words come out of her mouth. She never said anything about her feelings to her friends or even to me, her own child. If she said anything, she would simply say that all of these things that were happening or have happened had already been written in one's book of fate. T'ako nan p'alcha—your fate is something that you are born with and keep, from the time of your birth to the end of your life. I was with my mother when she passed away. I was forty-six years old then. She passed away quite early, so I don't know why I'm sticking around like this. It's no good to be living until this age. To live long is not a blessing but rather a burden--it is not a blessing, it is a sin....

My son and I began to live separately from when he was twenty-five years old. One day he didn't come home from his job in the factory. I didn't hear a word from him for a couple of days, and then one day I received a phone call from him. "Okā-san, sumimasen (Mother, I'm sorry). I found a job in Tokyo, and I'll be staying here for a while." I was glad to hear his voice and I was happy to hear that he was working. It seems that he borrowed the money from his friend for his train ticket to Tokyo. Since then we have always lived apart. My son is now in his seventies as well ... ha, ha (she laughs quietly). So we have been apart for a long time... . When he was a baby and he would cry and cry, my grandmother would almost beg me to give him some milk. . . . Mmmm ... (she sighs).

My daughter, too—we've lived apart for a long time. After her brother left, she also moved to Tokyo. I think it has been about thirty years that we have lived so far apart. Before, my children used to tell me to come and join them in Tokyo. But I have been living here since I came to Japan. I have never moved away from here. This place has become like my kohyang. Now they don't bother to ask me any more. I'm lucky if at least I am able to see their faces once a year....I have been living alone up until now.... I guess when it is time for me to die, I might as well die alone, too. When you are born, you come into the world alone, and when you leave, you go on your way alone.... I think this is the best way....

When I was in my late twenties, my hands were just like yours. When people touched my hand they would literally jump back and pull their hand away in shock, because of its coldness. Every month, when the thing would come, I wouldn't be able to move, because of the terrible pain in my stomach and in my back. Then, one day, in my neighborhood, all the old women were talking about the famous acupuncturist who was passing through. I thought I should just give it a try. At that time, I don't know why, but I was quite thin and sickly. When the old gentleman felt my pulse, he said that there was wind within my body. I wasn't sure what that meant. But he treated me a total of three times. Each time he only used about four needles. I remember thinking back then, "What good would these few needles do?" Then, he gave me one month's worth of herbal medicine. He promised that after I drank the medicine faithfully, I would never get sick in my life again. He said that he couldn't guarantee my mental state, but physically, I would be strong until a very old age. Well, so far he has been right. Until now, I have never been ill. Now because of my old age, sometimes, my knees ache a bit, but I have never fallen ill to the point of lying down for even a day. Nowadays you can't find acupuncturists like that. The ones that really know how to heal use only a few needles and a combination of the right herbs....

Kim, Jackie J. Hidden Treasures: Lives of First-Generation Korean Women in Japan. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2005; 77-94, with notes.