“How do you know I don’t treat myself?” But the truth is the idea seems foreign to Young-sook. She worked to help her brothers and sister, support her father until his death, grow vegetables, and bring home seaweed and turban shells for her children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren to eat. She fills the lengthening silence. “We have a saying: The granny who weaves on a loom as her work has five rolls of cloth in her old age, but the granny who dives all her life doesn’t even have proper underwear. I began with empty hands. I’ll never forget the memory of being hungry, but the saying is wrong. I was able to help my children go to school and buy them houses and fields.” She glances at the girl, who stares back at her, still wanting more. “I have plenty of underwear too!” This brings a smile to Clara’s face, and Young-sook goes on. “I couldn’t be more content than I am now.”
“There must be something you’ve wanted—”
Young-sook finds herself trying to answer. “I wish I could have had an education. If I’d learned more, then I could have helped my children more.” She glances over to Clara to see how the girl is taking the response, but her head is bent as she picks through seaweed dotted with bits of plastic. She’s fast, efficient in her movements. When she doesn’t come back with a follow-up question, Young-sook answers the one she wishes Clara had asked. “So maybe I did more than I’ll admit, because my children and grandchildren have accomplished a lot. My son owns a computer business in Seoul. I have a grandson who’s a chef in Los Angeles, and one of my granddaughters is a makeup artist—”
This brings forth a spiral of giggles.
“Why is that so funny?” Young-sook asks.
Clara leans forward as if to confide. “Someone’s tattooed your eyebrows and lips.”
That stings, because all haenyeo Young-sook’s age have done this. Her great-grandson called it, in English, a fad. Just as her dyed and permed hair is a fad.
“Hyng,” Young-sook bristles. “Even an old woman wants to look beautiful.”
The half-and-half girl giggles. The old woman knows what she’s thinking: Weird!
Young-sook’s patience evaporates. “Why are you here anyway?”
“Here?”
Young-sook spells it out. “On my beach.”
“My mother sent me. You’ve got to know that.”
“I can’t help her.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Won’t.”
“That’s what I told her.”
“Then why are you here?”
It’s a simple question, but the girl goes in a different direction. “Your kids and their families, who live in other places, do you see them often?”
“I already told you I’ve gone to America. My grandson has me come every other year—”
“To Los Angeles—”
“Yes, Los Angeles. And I go to the mainland to visit the family who live there. Then every spring, the whole family comes here. It’s been my privilege to introduce each of my grandchildren and great-grandchildren to the sea.”
“How deep can you go?”
“Now or back when I was the best haenyeo?”
“Now.”
Young-sook spreads her arms out wide. “Fifteen times this.”
“Would you ever take me in the water? I’m a good swimmer. Have I told you that yet? I’m on the swim team at my school…”
PART III
Fear
1947–1949
The Shadow of a Nightmare
Immediately after the war, we had great hopes for independence, but the Japanese colonists had merely been replaced by American occupiers through the United States Army Military Government in Korea. Each morning and every evening, Jun-bu turned on his transistor radio. We heard Americans speaking in their language and others translating for them. They seemed to have come to the same conclusion that the Japanese had reached long ago: Jeju had a great strategic location. The island was now an American stepping-stone, only this time it led to the USSR, so instead of Japanese regiments, we had the Americans’ 749th Field Artillery, the Fifty-first Field Artillery, the Twentieth Regiment of the Sixth Division, and the Fifty-ninth Military Government Company. The commander of the government group, Major Thurman A. Stout, became Jeju Military Governor Stout. He ruled side by side with Park Gyeong-hun, who’d been appointed as the Korean governor. The People’s Committees opposed this, since neither man had been elected, but they were powerless to make a change. Governor Stout made lots of speeches, but the radio also had interviews with Captain Jones, Captain Partridge, Captain Martin, and captain, captain, captain. One day, Governor Stout announced, “In the interests of a peaceful and effective transfer, we’re asking officials from the former administration to return to their jobs. We also welcome all former policemen to work with us.”
“But every one of them is a former collaborator!” Jun-bu fumed. He wasn’t the only one to be upset. Most people took these moves to mean that the Americans were siding with the right-wingers and that the administration of the island—and small villages—would shift away from the People’s Committees to the police and constabulary. It was as if the Americans didn’t understand what they’d inherited.
But anger can be dangerous and have unintended consequences. The relationship between Governor Stout and the People’s Committees continued to sour. At the same time, recruitment posters for the Ninth Regiment of the Korean Constabulary were distributed to every village. Jun-bu read one of them to me: “The Korean Constabulary is neither a right-wing nor a left-wing organization. It is a patriotic military agency for youngbloods who love their comrades and are willing to die for their country. We are not the hunting dog of a certain country. We are not the puppet of a certain political party. We are simply the bulwark of the state, which tries to pursue Korea’s independence and defend our beloved homeland.” The constabulary’s actions, however, sent a clearer message. Its troops, many of whom had served in the Imperial Japanese Army, moved into the barracks at the former Japanese Navy Air Service air base in Moseulpo, which sent outrage around the island.
Through it all, people struggled to understand what the other side was saying. So much so that the U.S. military government opened an English academy. Men who’d been conscripted by the Japanese, had worked as collaborators, or had been educated abroad, were encouraged to sign up, which Jun-bu and Sang-mun did. As Jun-bu explained his decision to me, “How can I help change things if I sit by and do nothing?” I thought of my husband as being very smart, but he did not excel in learning this new language. Every night, he struggled with the lessons. Even the children and I picked up the basic sentences faster and better than he did, reciting the lines back and forth to each other like a call-and-response haenyeo song. Hello… Hello! What is your name? My name is… Do you have… Yes, I do… Where is… Turn right at…
Sang-mun, whom I did not respect, grasped the language so quickly that the Americans hired him to do almost the same job he’d done for the Japanese. He managed their supplies, making sure they were delivered from the port or airfield to the proper base or warehouse. They gave him a house to live in at their facility in Hamdeok, which was only three kilometers from Bukchon. He was on the road a lot, often staying away for nights at a time. Perhaps this is why Mi-ja did not become pregnant again, while I was just getting over another bout of morning sickness. No one could believe my belly had a third baby in it already, when Min-lee was about to turn two and Sung-soo was only nine months old. Sure, the haenyeo I dove with teased me, but I felt proud. I wished, though, that Mi-ja and I could be pregnant again together as we’d been during leaving-home water-work. I’d felt so close to her then and was certain Min-lee and Yo-chan would always be close as a result.