Mother, not wanting to wake the neighbor, would squat down by the neighbor's house, listening for the
clock's hourly chimes.
Years later, when I returned home from Paldogu, my uncle's wife asked me how my father was and then
she told me how relieved she was that I lived so close to my school in Paldogu. She recalled how tough it
was to send my father to school on time without a clock in the house. Our family home did not have a
clock until the day of Liberation.
Dirty poor though we were, it was our family tradition to share whatever we had with needy neighbors
and relatives. Even though we lived on rice gruel more often than not, we helped other people as much as
we could.
Grandpa used to tell us - "You can live without money, but you cannot live without kindness.", which
became my family tradition and way of life, our philosophy. My father was eager to learn new ideas and
had a high level of scholastic aptitude. He wanted to attend formal schools after learning the one-thousand-
character prose from a traditional village scholar..
In the year of the Hague Secret Mission incident, students from Sunwha, Chuja, Chilgol and Sinhung
gathered at Sulmae for an athletic competition. My father attended the gathering representing Sunwha.
He competed in iron-bar, wrestling, running and other athletic events. He won all but the high-jump,
because his hair knot caught the bar. He was so angry that he went to a nearby hill after the game and
chopped off the offending knot. Tying up man's hair into a knot was a Korean custom several hundred
years old and chopping it off without parents prior permission was a dead serious breach of filial piety.
Upon learning of my father's act, Grandpa wailed as if the world was about to come to an end.
Father, realizing belatedly the seriousness of his misdeed, stayed away form Grandpa and spent the night
hanging around outdoors. My great grandma saw him and took food out to him during the night. My
father was her favorite offspring and she was the one who made it possible for my father to attend the
school. She was the one who had persuaded Grandpa to send my father to school. Grandpa, a stalwart of
feudality, did not think much of modern schools. Father started at Sungsil in the spring of 1911, a year
after our nation was lost. In those days, Korea was still in Dark Ages and even rich yangban families were
reluctant to send their kids to a modern school. Sending a kid through middle school education was,
indeed, unusual, especially for such a poor household as ours that barely subsisted.
The school tuition was two won in those days. To get two won, my mother collected and peddled clams
from Sunwha River, Grandpa raised sweet melons, Grandma worked fields and even my 15-year old
uncle worked to raise my father's tuition. My father, too, worked at his school's experimental farm for
long hours after the classes, after which he studied at the school library for several hour before walking 30
ri to home. He would have no more than two hours to sleep before the breakfast time for another grueling
day.
Ours was a farm family, not uncommon in villages all over Korea. We were honest, hard-working, poor
farmers. We had nothing outstanding; we were just a normal farming family. One thing different about us
was that we were passionately patriotic, willing to die for our country. My great grandfather was a mere
grave caretaker for a landowner, but he was an ardent nationalist. The General Sherman, an American
merchant marine, invaded our land and sailed up Taedong River to Turu Island, killing many Koreans
with rifle and cannon fire. My great grandpa was one of those villagers who gathered up straw ropes and
strung them up across the river from Kongyu Island to Mangyong Peak, to blocked the escape path of the
American invaders. They threw rocks at the invaders.
Lee Wha Rang notes: Modern Pyongyang maps show Turu and Konryu islands. The General Sherman
was stranded near Turu, which sailed up this far on flooded Taedong River. Kim Il Sung's great
grandfathers was among the villagers who helped destroy the ship. Kim Il Sung was born in Mangyong-
dae (bottom-left corner). At age seven, Kim Il Sung walked across a wooden bridge over Potong River to
visit his father in prison. It is not clear which bridge he crossed.
The invaders advanced to Yang-gak Island, shooting cannon and rifles at the crowd, pillaging and raping
along the way. Mt great grandpa led his villagers to the Pyongyang Fort and joined the soldiers and
volunteers from other villages gathered there. They placed firewood on small boats and sent them burning
to the enemy ship. The enemy ship and her entire crew were eliminated. After the Sherman incident, the
American imperialists dispatched the warship Shenandoah, which pillaged our villages at the Taedong
estuary. Once again, the Mangyong-dae villagers took up arms to repel the invaders.
Grandpa used to tell us - "It is proper for man to die fighting the enemy", and told us to serve our nation.
Grandpa proudly sent his children and grandchildren to the battle ground of anti-Japanese movement
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