I just received a computer at work. This means I can finally access my google account from the school. I don't care to spend my limited free time in the evenings writing posts, which should explain my long absence from the blogosphere (If you follow Jill's blog you will know this is not from a lack of noteworthy things to write about). Only time will tell if Blogger access at work will produce more online material for your reading pleasure.
I was able to Skype with my folks today and they had asked me a little bit about North Korea. If you are like me, you are always wondering how much information the American media is actually giving on certain issues. I would love to sit here and write an articulate account of South Korean views towards the Norths testing of a long range missile. This would be incredibly hard to do though. There are the obvious issues of language barriers between me and the South Korean friends and coworkers I get to talk to and I also believe there is a frustration with the whole North South situation that is not often talked about.
The other day I was riding in a car with a man from my school. I asked him about the North Korean missile test and what he thought about it. He is a smart man, but his English is limited. He was able to communicate to me that the missile test upset him. There seemed to be a frustration in his voice about the state of Korean affairs. He mentioned how China, Japan, Russia and America all had a role to play in negotiating with the North, but I could tell he felt like the context of the whole situation was wrong. He clearly does not care for Kim Jung Il, but there was a deep love and respect for the people of North Korea. When I asked him how he felt about the people from North Korea he said "North Korean people and South Korean people are one family." I asked him him if he wanted a reunification of the North and South and he looked at me very seriously and said, "I very very want!" This made me wonder what the response to the North would be from people who see North Korea as part of their family.
This conversation obviously does not do much in the way of helping to find a solution to the rising tensions with North Korea, but I think it does provide some context for any of you who hear North Korea mentioned in the news. Most Koreans believe that an artificial line was drawn in the sand 60 years ago and they have deep deep wishes for that line to be erased. The interesting thing I took away from this conversation was his ability to separate his feelings from the North Korean state and the North Korean people. It reminded my of my trip to Nicaragua while Bush was president. I had a number of different conversations with people who did not like "America", but loved Americans. They disagreed with American foreign policy, yet they warmly embraced me as an American.
There are times where it is easy to think of a government and a people as one entity. Especially coming from a country that is supposed to be "by the people and for the people". I was encouraged by my conversation with my friend. It reminded me that there is a longing for reunification within all of us. It also made me wonder what a foreign policy would look like if we all had the sense that people on the other side of "the line" are part of our family.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I was trying to think about the "one family" thing and i'm thinking back to North Koreans attacking South Koreans and how someone can forgive something like that when it was pretty recent...and i realized, i don't have the slightest clue about that war. I didn't learn anything about it in school, i don't know how or why it started or what leaders were involved. The facts i thought i knew were all about Vietnam when i really thought about them. I know a lot of Americans died and i know we call it the "Forgotten War". Seems like a pretty apt name...(oh, and hurrah for the American education system.)
I am so glad you titled this post Kim Jong Ill Communication
All I know, is from what I studied prior to coming here. It seems that Korea was arbitrarily divided up by the USA and USSR following WWII. It had been controlled by Japan prior. Overnight two countries existed out of one. In those new countries governments were set up in accordance with their "patron" countries. The war that happened later was an ideological power struggle at the beginning of the cold war.
Post a Comment