One of the soldiers took the tools from the boy soldier’s hands, and 30 minutes later the engine of the car made a tumultuous sound. Only half the passengers had returned, and the soldiers didn’t wait for the rest. The snub-nosed woman didn’t return, so, for five won, I shared another woman’s plastic bag.
Friendship with Kkot-jebi
On arrival at Kowon Station early the next morning, I saw many kinds of people, and more kkot-jebi than you’d find in the Pyongyang station and street market. They wandered around, begging for food from the crowds of people waiting for the train. Cigarette smoke and offensive smells greeted me everywhere. People with large bags grouped together—it made it easier to keep an eye on their belongings.
The railroad police patrolled the station wearing dark-green uniforms and expressionless faces, picking through people’s bags with their fingers or with their thick, shiny truncheons. They looked about my age or a little older. Shifty-eyed men hung about like smoke in the air, stealing glances at people’s bags. Young girls with worn-out clothes but thick makeup were everywhere, shouting, “Flower! Buy a flower!” But none held flowers. They only approached well-dressed, young and middle-aged men. Everything was unfamiliar, and everyone looked suspicious to me.
I wandered through the station but couldn’t find a place to sit down. I suddenly felt someone was watching me carefully, following my movements, and I turned my head to find a small boy, dressed in tatters. Like other kkot-jebi, his face was covered with dust. Under his hat, his eyes were twinkling, and as soon as they met mine, he walked directly to me, with a slight limp. That was my first encounter with Sangwon.
When he was close enough, he smiled and asked, “Do you have some food to share with me?”
I looked down at him skeptically, and he didn’t take his eyes off me. Of course, I didn’t have food to share. Everyone knew no one had food to share; the only way hungry people could survive was to steal, so this boy was either really bold or not so smart.
Setting out on my journey, I had made a firm resolution that I wouldn’t share food; my own survival came first. I had just one loaf of bread and an ear of corn, and I needed to save what little money I had left. But Sangwon’s blunt eyes, so steady on mine, made me hesitate. Or perhaps it was his limping leg that changed my mind.
I said, “I just have one piece of bread and one ear of corn.”
I would have felt better if he had pretended to cry or grab my leg, but he just pouted with his lower lip, shrugged his shoulders, and said, “Okay. If you think that isn’t enough for two people, that’s fine. Have a good trip.”
He was funny. His way of watching me and withdrawing without a fuss compounded my guilt.
As he turned around to walk away, I called after him. “Wait… Maybe… we can make do with these for breakfast.”
Sangwon turned back and smiled. “And then I might help you if it’s your first time traveling,” he said, winking. “I know where we can have a peaceful meal.”
Like a gentleman escorting me, Sangwon gestured in the direction we should walk, strutting triumphantly, as though he had won something. His wiry body moved nimbly through the crowd.
He took me outside the station to an out-of-the-way corner that was chilly but still the perfect place for two people to sit side by side. Not too stinky either. He took his jacket off and shook it briefly. Laying it on the ground, he grinned, motioning for me to sit down. I felt the ground would be cleaner than his jacket, but I didn’t rebuff the offer. Sangwon sat down next to me on the bare ground.
He smacked his lips as I took the food out of my bag, so I broke the bread in two and gave him the bigger half.
“I haven’t seen bread for a long time. I eat watery gruel every day. That place only makes begging on the street look good.” He stuffed himself with bread.
“Which place?” I asked.
“The nine-twenty-seven. I just got out of the nine-twenty-seven. Have you heard of it?” His big, round eyes turned to me; his cheeks bulged.
I had heard of the 927. The government tried to move beggars and people unable to make a living on their own to a specific place in each province, forcing them into abandoned buildings, usually former hotels. Because this system was instituted on September 27, 1997, it was called the 927. Supposedly it kept people from dying of hunger.
“Why didn’t you stay there? At least you’d be fed regularly.”
Sangwon’s eyes bugged. “Are you kidding? Have you ever slept sitting up for several nights? That place doesn’t protect people, it creates more problems. People die in there from diseases and hunger—we don’t need that kind of protection.” He ripped a piece of hard bread off with his teeth and ate it; he reminded me of a lion gnawing the meat off a bone.
“Why would you sleep sitting up?”
Sangwon stopped chewing and opened his mouth halfway. “You don’t know anything. You’re an alien, no wonder you stuck out.”
He finished his bite and swallowed. “They put too many people in one small room. We all ate better on the outside.”
When he spoke, he had to look up at me, and because his big hat covered his eyes, he took it off. His head was clean except for several scabs forming over his sores. He had no eyebrows or eyelashes; there was not one strand of hair on his face. He looked as if he had escaped from a Buddhist temple, not the 927.
“How long were you in there?” I asked, interrupting his eating again.
“Who knows? I gave up counting after seventeen days. Sitting in a corner, counting the days, made me more desperate. Anyway, I need to leave here as soon as possible. I don’t want to end up back there.”
“How did you run away?” I asked.
This time, he didn’t raise his head to speak. “Through the window. I was stuck on the sixth floor. Some of the kids made a rope with our clothes and we ran away together. When the girl right after me was climbing down, the rope snapped. She fell and was dead on the spot. It could have been me.”
I was shocked that such a small boy could talk about death with such a poker face.
Sangwon raised his head and his eyes fixed on my piece of bread. I hadn’t started eating yet, so I handed it to him.
He shook his head. “I’m not going to eat my fill. I don’t want to make my stomach expand.” He patted his gut and smiled. “This guy is so sneaky. I give him enough food, but he always wants more. He’s never completely satisfied, so I have to control him, or he’ll control me. That’s your share. I really appreciate what you gave me, but that’s enough for today.” He looked at me candidly, his eyes twinkling. Who could resist this face?
Sangwon pushed my hand back and urged me to eat the bread. I noticed that there were two stumps on his left hand where his fourth and fifth fingers should have been.
He saw me staring at his hand and raised both hands to show me. “I was lucky. That time, I was using my left hand and not my right.”
He had tried to steal some food from a market stall while the owner wasn’t paying attention, but just as Sangwon’s hand approached the food, the owner caught sight of him and grabbed his knife. He just wanted to scare him, but Sangwon’s two fingers were lopped off in an instant. The owner was as surprised as Sangwon, and they wept loudly together. Sangwon got the food from the owner, but his fingers were lost.
Sangwon told this as if it was someone else’s story. He must have been used to it—he spoke so well. He looked about six or seven years old, but I guessed he was 11 or 12.