I don’t know why, but people often mistake me for Japanese. While abroad, I’ve had Westerners come up to me and blurt out “Japan?” as if they already knew the answer. Even Japanese people would greet me in their own language without the slightest hesitation. Anyone who can relate to this kind of experience understands why I can’t help but squint at my reflection whenever I find myself standing in front of a mirror.
Could it be because of my narrow forehead and thick eyebrows? Or perhaps my pointed chin? Maybe my snaggletooth? I’m not sure. I don’t think my face is so out of the ordinary to the point where I should have to question my bloodline. I believe it probably has more to do with things like my hairstyle, the way I dress, my body language, and the kind of faces I make. I wonder if it isn’t these internalized cultural traits and the impression they give off that creates such confusion in others. I’m talking about my three years spent studying abroad in Japan, about my having read Osamu Dazai’s No Longer Human a good seven times over in the original Japanese, about the Sapporo-style miso ramen I enjoy eating to this day. Perhaps, this country that I visit five to six times a year on business has imbued me with a Japanese aura of my own. If it’s not that, then I have no other way of explaining why even my fellow countrymen sometimes address me in Japanese.
When a taxi driver, leaning against the side of his cab with a cigarette in hand, exclaimed, “Ohayou gozaimasu!” (Good morning!), I didn’t even bother to look around. He could only be addressing himself to me. I was on my way back from a business trip to Kyoto and had been drinking with some clients until the crack of dawn, so all I wanted was to get back home as quickly as possible and get some rest.
The man proceeded to swiftly drop his cigarette and stomp it out. He then walked up to me and fished my suitcase right out of my hands. It all happened in the blink of an eye. Had there not been a cab parked nearby, one could have easily mistaken his act for a snatch-and-run. I wasn’t offended. After all, the driver had already greeted me, and I personally couldn’t care less which taxi took me home. Those who seemed upset by his behavior were the other drivers who’d been patiently waiting for their turn in front of him. They all looked at him with disdain. One driver spat on the ground. “Come on now! We all have mouths to feed!” another one taunted. Showing no concern, my taxi driver shoved my suitcase inside the trunk and hopped nimbly into the vehicle.
“Douzo yoroshiku,” I casually greeted him as I slipped into the passenger seat, speaking in Japanese as though I were still in Japan.
I would normally have said something like “I’m actually Korean!” or “Do I really look Japanese?,” but I was feeling playful that day. I didn’t mean to pretend I was Japanese to the very end. I intended to reveal my true self after playing along a little and perhaps asking him what made him think I was Japanese in the first place.
I thought his Japanese would be limited to no more than a few basic greetings. No doubt there were taxi drivers who had worked other jobs when they were younger and some of them might’ve been quite proficient in Japanese. That being said, I just didn’t get the feeling that my driver had ever worked at a desk for a living. He had short hair like a soldier, a darkly tanned face, and his body looked as stout as a tree trunk. He also had a pencil stub tucked behind one ear. I could tell he was no stranger to hard physical work and sweat. Neither his dress shirt nor his necktie could hide it. The loose-fitting dress shirt that looked borrowed and the long out-of-style necktie he wore only reinforced my hunch. His clothes also gave off a faint naphthalene smell. The deep creases around the sides of his mouth told the story of a man who’d done the same repetitive work all his life. Like he’d formed a protective stubbornness.
“Dochira e irasshaimasu ka?” (Where would you like me to take you?), he asked.
His pronunciation was surprisingly good, and his way of speaking sounded quite natural, too. But then again, it was one of those phrases anyone could easily memorize.
“Gimpo eapotto made onegai shimasu.” (Please take me to Gimpo Airport.)
Although I did live close to the airport, I didn’t really intend on going there. Once we got closer to our destination, I was planning to tell him in Korean where I really wanted him to drop me off.
“Chotto matte kudasai.” (Just a moment, please.)The driver excused himself and grabbed the notepad resting on top of the dashboard.
Next, he licked the tip of his pencil and filled out a trip log.
12:36, Incheon Airport to Gimpo Airport, 1 Japanese man.
If the majority of his customers were tourists, I could see how he might have memorized a few handy expressions like these that he could pull out when getting the change ready for them. What really struck me were the three Chinese characters he used to jot down “Japanese man.” As I looked at the characters in front of me, I felt like I’d stepped into a river and the only way out was to cross to the other side.
Would I have set the record straight with him right then and there had he written those same two words in Korean? What a bizarre situation I found myself in. Since I’d told the driver my destination and the meter was already running, I thought it safe to assume I wouldn’t have to open my mouth again for the rest of the trip. But my conversation with him didn’t end there. He had so much to say, I thought he’d forgotten I was his passenger and had mistaken me for his confidant.
His command of Japanese far exceeded my expectations, but his overly formal and mechanical way of speaking suggested that he’d probably studied on his own using old textbooks during his spare time. I was itching to correct his Japanese every time I was unpleasantly reminded of the limits of autodidacticism, but he never gave me the chance to interrupt him. I knew what it was. What kept me drawn in wasn’t his proficiency in Japanese, but the very stories he was telling me. His stories kept me on the edge of my seat and compelled me to keep listening. That’s why I chose to recall the whole encounter with him here in Korean. Even though I had to change a few words here and there to make it sound more natural, I made sure to keep the essence of the stories untouched.
“I see you’re transferring to a domestic flight,” said the cab driver as soon as we got off the airport expressway.
“Yes.”
“Are you here for work?” He seemed to have noticed the suit I was wearing.
“Yes,” I replied again curtly, hoping he would stop asking questions.
“What kind of business brings you here?” he followed up.
The driver seemed to have other thoughts than simply focusing on the road in front of us. Perhaps he felt like it was a good opportunity for him to display his language skills. I could relate: when I was making a lot of progress in Japanese, I also felt like striking up conversations with random strangers who looked Japanese, whether it was on the subway or at a more touristy spot like an ancient palace.
I wasn’t able to answer right away.
The man stole a quick glance in my direction.
A voice inside my head was telling me it was time to cut the crap. But the next words to come flying out of my mouth were that I’d come to South Korea to conduct field research—which was a lie. What surprised me most was the peculiar thrill in my chest at that moment.
It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling. I used to make up characters inside my mind that I would impersonate in front of women I met at nightclubs. And I wasn’t doing so with the aim of impressing them. Had my true goal been to score with women, I wouldn’t have pretended to have been a baseball scorekeeper, but rather, a baseball player. I also wouldn’t have said that I was studying to become a public clerk, but that I was a legal practitioner. Same thing for the “wannabe” writer story—I would’ve just pretended to have been a rising new author instead. I welcomed the lucky occasion when a random woman would feel drawn to my insignificant life even though it screamed “Warning!” like a pair of blinking emergency lights. Just the sheer act of drawing up this fictitious identity for myself was enough to excite me.
What gave me the biggest thrill was coming up with all the little details required to make my imaginary life sound real. Borrowing the words from a spy fiction novel
I’d read, it was vital to add a bit of “spice,” and this is how I managed. “I flip a coin when I’m not sure whether to score a play as a hit or an error.” “If you shoot someone already committing suicide as he plunges from the top of a building, does that make it murder?” “When I’m writing a story, I rewrite the first sentence a few hundred times over. That’s because literary contest judges filter out over ninety percent of drafts based on the first sentence alone.”
I only tell stories that are bound to capture the listener’s attention. Most importantly, I make sure my lies are so meticulous as to be believable. Whenever I find myself in the process of thinking up all the sparkling, gem-like details to my stories, I feel like I’m some kind of a secret agent living under a fictitious identity. Like I’m a spy concealing his true nature and waiting for the decisive rendezvous.
I didn’t think my imaginary constructs would cause any harm. A true spy doesn’t seek out someone he’s crossed paths with a second time. There was virtually no chance I’d ever bump into the same woman again, which is why I wasn’t worried about getting caught. I did feel just the slightest twinge of guilt when I would see the innocent eyes of a girl listening to me with undivided attention. But in my defense, the noise from the banging music in the background was way too loud for me to cock an ear to the inner voice of reason. Not to mention the kind of pleasure I got in return for the cost of a few drinks and the use of a little imagination was by no means insignificant.
“What kind of work do you do?” the driver asked me.
“I’m here to develop new package tours,” I replied.
Even without the loud music to suppress the voice of my conscience, or without the help of alcohol to untie my knotted tongue, I effortlessly managed to come up with a fictitious life history that gave credibility to my made-up persona. I really did work for a travel agency, so what I said wasn’t completely groundless.
Not all lies based on truth are convincing, but all convincing lies are born out of some degree of truth. To become a baseball scorekeeper had been my childhood dream, and I’d spent my teenage years trying to live up to the expectations of my parents who wanted me to get into law school. I also can’t say that I never harbored the idea of actually writing an original spy novel either. I might be living in two worlds running parallel to each other. One where, nervously shaking my leg under a dim light, I impulsively created all of these different identities for myself—and another one in which I went about my real life. I know nothing about theories of parallel universes, but what I do know is that when I find myself thinking about all the different ways my life could’ve turned out had it not been for a few careless decisions, there comes a moment when my concentration sharpens to such an extent that I feel like my consciousness can thread the tiny eye of a needle. Such moments seem to offer me a glimpse into a parallel world, a hidden and yet unknown dimension of this vast universe.
“Oh, I see,” the driver replied.
I felt a bit disappointed because I was hoping he’d ask me more about the package tours. I would’ve told him about the Hallyu tour I’d thought up which would allow travelers to experience K-pop culture firsthand. In fact, developing new package tours had been something I’d really wanted to try. That was all I could think about during this business trip. As I discussed the demands of customers with managers of major hotel chains, it struck me that we should diversify the accommodations to match different themes. I also found myself fiddling with the idea that we could provide travelers with different kinds of restaurant options depending on which time of the year they visited.
Had I played the wrong card? There was no way a taxi driver would have absolutely no interest in the tourism industry. Perhaps I’d just been too quick to reveal my hand? Should I only have told him that I worked for a travel agency? I felt somewhat perplexed by the sudden change in his behavior considering he seemed eager enough to ask about my shoe size just minutes ago. His indifference struck me as a red flag. I would’ve been wiser to have folded, but I had another card up my sleeve to turn the situation around. Had this happened at a nightclub I could’ve simply withdrawn to the dance floor in search of my next victim, but I was stuck in a taxi racing down the highway at full speed and couldn’t even lift my butt off my seat.
The driver had put on a pair of sunglasses without me noticing although there wasn’t a cloud in the sky; the sun wasn’t so bright as to be blinding, either. Was he trying to signal that our conversation was over? He had his eyes fixed on the road with his lips sealed tight as though we’d never exchanged a word.
The driver finally opened his mouth as I was contemplating the sheep-shaped air freshener sitting on top of the dashboard. One of the sheep’s eyes was winking at me while its head steadily bobbed up and down to the rhythm of the racing car. There was nothing particularly eye-catching about it. It was the kind of object you could easily find in the car accessories section of any large, big-name store.
“That’s a gift from my granddaughter. I was born in the Year of the Sheep,” the driver said.
“You must be sixty-one, then?”
“Seventy-three.”
“Really? You don’t look it.”
“Why, thank you,” he replied, removing his sunglasses.
I wasn’t sweet-talking him. He really did look younger than his age. Contrary to his wrinkled skin, both his eyes and voice seemed firmly unwilling to succumb to the passage of time.
He stuffed his glasses into the pocket of his dress shirt and carried on.
“You see, I’ve escaped from the hands of death on several occasions. That means I have to live for all those who didn’t get the same chance as me. For instance, not long ago there was a ninety-seven-car pileup on the bridge you see over there. Nine people died. It was so foggy that day I couldn’t even see my hand when I stuck it out my car window.”
The driver knitted his brows as he spoke, as though he were trying to navigate through very thick fog.
We could see Yeongjong Bridge off in the distance. If that was the accident he was talking about, I knew about it too. It had made the headlines of the evening news for two consecutive days.
“I was at Incheon airport that day but gave up on a few potential customers to make a trip to the bathroom because my stomach wasn’t feeling well. I guess that’s what saved me from getting sandwiched in the pileup. It was a really close call. The very car in front of me couldn’t avoid the crash.”
“Sounds like luck was on your side. It seems as though you managed to pull the brakes just in time, too.”
I had a hard time believing he’d stopped his car right on the edge of such a disaster. I thought he was making it up. In a fog so thick he couldn’t even see his hand when he stuck it out the car window? Give me a break.
“To tell you the truth, I was able to smell the blood.”
“Smell the blood?”
“I was hit by wafts of blood coming like waves from inside the sticky fog. You can imagine the moment I caught on to the smell I slammed on the breaks and started hitting my horn like my life depended on it.”
The smell of blood? Please! Did he think I was that gullible?
“I didn’t actually feel afraid until after I had stopped the car. I couldn’t see even a single inch in front of me. Sitting in that fog unable to move sent chills down my spine. I couldn’t get out of my car. It would’ve been suicide. My mind turned blank as though the fog had reached inside my head. The most terrifying thing was that there was nothing I could do. I was at the mercy of the next blindfolded driver coming behind me, making his way through the heavy fog.”
“You must have been terrified,” I said.
“Know what I did next?”
“Pray?”
For whatever reason, the driver’s face stiffened noticeably. We were getting on the bridge. He kept silent as though he were aiming for a dramatic effect. Although I thought he was bluffing, I was still curious to hear what he would say next.
He finally spoke.
“I removed one of my socks, rolled it into a ball, and stuck it between my teeth.”
“A sock?”
“So I wouldn’t bite my tongue off if the car behind came crashing into me. I turned around later to take a look at my passenger sitting in the backseat and guess what? He had done the same thing. He was a young Uzbek man who said he’d come to Korea to study auto mechanics. He didn’t know why I’d put a sock in my mouth, but he just followed what I did. I feel bad saying this because of those who lost their lives in the tragedy, but when we both looked at each other with a sock in our mouths, we couldn’t help but burst out laughing. In any case, we managed to make it unscathed.”
The driver’s face stiffened even more. Perhaps he was reminded of the chilling scene.
“I see.”
I almost fell for his story, but I remained suspicious because of how detailed his account was. I was fine with the fact that he could remember his client being from Uzbekistan, but to act like he could recall what the man said about coming to Korea to study auto mechanics seemed to be pushing it too far. Overdetailing is a strategy often used to cover up a lie. Isn’t there a saying about the devil being in the details? Gregor Samsa awoke one morning and found himself transformed into an enormous insect. That’s enough. No need to be more specific about whether it was a cabbage worm or a ladybug. No one cares what kind of insect it was.
I lost my train of thought at the sound of sudden honking. We were bumper to bumper with the car in front of us. We were so close in fact that I could pick out the scratches on the car’s license plate. Yet my driver kept honking as though he were going to bulldoze his way through.
I looked at him. He glared at the car in front of us with his head bent forward, the veins bulging out of his flushed neck. He looked like he was trying to escape from something chasing him down.
“I forget, do Japanese people also follow Chinese horoscopes?” he asked, changing the topic as though he’d sensed that my eyes were on him.
I didn’t see that one coming. The reason I’d guessed the driver’s age so quickly was because my zodiac sign is also a sheep.
It wasn’t the first time something like this had happened to me. Just as he didn’t know anything about me, I didn’t know anything about my driver either, which meant I had to be careful not to get beaten at my own game. I’d once pretended having been to Greenland only for the other person to ask me a question about narwhals. I was caught so blatantly off guard that I was left fumbling for words. I’d obviously never set foot on that land of ice paradoxically called Greenland, and I’d never heard about that oddly named creature either. The only reason I’d pretended to be a seasoned polar region traveler was because I was worried the other person might have traveled to any one of the more popular destinations. But as luck would have it, of course, that person turned out to be a true polar region enthusiast.
Even to this day, I can still feel the blood rushing to my face whenever I’m reminded of that incident. But it also taught me some important lessons. First, avoid anything too far-fetched. That can checkmate you. As I read in some creative writing book, you need to make sure you know what you’re talking about. Creativity doesn’t just come out of thin air—it comes from looking at everyday things through unique perspectives. I agree. Lesson number two is to say nothing more than what is necessary. A single misplaced word is all it takes to reduce your hard work down to nothing. According to the same book, isn’t the most important thing about a plot not what it says but rather what it doesn’t say? Of course, it is. But this couldn’t apply to the predicament I’d put myself in. Since I had to reply one way or another, choosing to remain silent would’ve been the worst thing I could do.
“Yes, they do,” I said.
I wasn’t sure if Japanese people really did follow the Chinese zodiac, but perhaps that’s why I chose to reply so emphatically. I did so while reminding myself of a specific passage I’d read in a spy novel: “You must not show any sign of hesitation when you are tossed a trick question meant to throw you off guard.” Sometimes you’re better off contradicting yourself than sounding uncertain. In any case, I wanted to avoid getting caught before I got the chance to reveal the truth myself. That would be no fun.
“When you think about it, bridges are really frightening. In case of an emergency, you can’t even escape to the sides,” the driver mumbled as he looked into the rearview mirror.
I also looked into the mirror. The load-bearing towers of the Yeongjong Bridge grew smaller and smaller in the distance. Both the needle on the speedometer, which had been pointing all the way right only moments ago, as well as the expression on the driver’s face, seemed to have regained their composure. It was as though nothing had happened. I think I understood what had brought my driver to honk his horn so frantically.
“I came close to dying in a bridge collapse, too.”
It seemed like he’d only been waiting for us to get off the bridge to begin telling the story of his second near-death experience.
What he said had nothing to do with the reply I’d given him earlier. I don’t even think he was curious to know the answer to the question he asked me. He had another anecdote he wanted to tell me, but in fear it might bring us bad luck, he superstitiously chose to keep his mouth shut and waited until we’d crossed to the other side. I felt stupid for agonizing so much over my answer.
“Was there an earthquake?” I asked.
Although I knew the name of the bridge he was talking about, I chose to feign ignorance. That being said, I didn’t have to go as far as asking him whether there had been an earthquake or not. It just goes to show how true I was to my character—I was a Japanese man on a business trip after all. It’s not like I’d taken it upon myself to play this role. I’d literally been forced into it the moment I stepped out of the airport terminal. I was turned into a Japanese man even before the automatic doors closed behind me. You can’t underestimate the magical power of language. When I speak Japanese, there are times when I find myself thinking like a Japanese person.
“An earthquake?” he retorted, as though he’d just heard a word he wasn’t familiar with. He then took a moment to look at me and nodded almost imperceptibly. It seemed like he’d forgotten my nationality.
“It wasn’t because of an earthquake. You might find it difficult to believe, but an entire span of the bridge suddenly collapsed as though it’d been hit by a bomb. The bridge had looked perfectly fine until that very moment. The cars driving down that portion of the bridge fell into the water and, as you might expect, many people died.”
“How on earth . . .”
“I don’t know if it’s because the water right below the bridge looked particularly dark on that day or what, but I just had an ominous feeling. Had I not decided to drive over to the next bridge further down to cross to the other side, who knows if I’d still be here today.”
I silently waited for him to continue. I was expecting him to add some extra details to raise the credibility of his story like he had done with the last one—his anecdote on how he somehow managed to miraculously survive the Yeongjong bridge pileup tragedy. At the same time, I was recalling that accident which had unfolded twenty-one years earlier. All I could remember of that day were some of my classmates skipping after-school tutoring to go take a look at the severed bridge. I didn’t have any other memories.
“I still don’t cross that bridge to this day,” he said.
That was all. He didn’t add anything else, no add-
itional dramatic details. I had my expectations thrown out the window. I didn’t know whether to believe him anymore. The first story he told me had too many details and this one too few. The fact that his stories didn’t follow any fixed pattern might’ve been evidence enough to think he wasn’t making it all up, but I also couldn’t completely exclude the possibility that this wasn’t just a product of careful calculation. It’s well known that a skilled spy never follows fixed patterns of behavior. You have to go with the flow. You have to ride the waves of unpredictability and be aware of the ebb and flow of the tide. As long as you don’t follow predictable patterns, not even Yama the King of Hell would be able to extract any information that he could use to punish you—even if he were to split your skull in half to take a look inside your brain.
I was suddenly knocked back to reality by the ringing of my phone and pulled it out without a second thought. It was my superior. I swiped the green answer button to the right to take the call, having completely forgotten I was in the middle of posing as a Japanese man. I shouldn’t have picked up, but it was already too late when I realized my blunder. I answered with a loud “Moshi-moshi!” (Hello!) in Japanese to make sure my driver heard me. I could picture my manager’s puzzled face on the other side of the line, but I didn’t have any other choice. I had only myself to blame for not turning my cellphone off. My superior asked me to report on my business trip and other annoying stuff, to which I absurdly replied that I would go see him to discuss the details of our contract right after dropping my luggage at the hotel. Entirely in Japanese, of course.
I felt uneasy after hanging up in such a haste. I chose to send my superior a short text message. I apologize for what just happened. I will explain myself later.
Knowing that my manager might send me a reply, I couldn’t bring myself to turn off my cellphone. I set my device on vibration mode and prayed he wouldn’t try to call back. That was all I could do.
I didn’t hear back from him. I had no idea how I would explain myself. He would think I was silly if I told him the truth, so that option was out of the question. Even though I racked my brain, I couldn’t come up with a clever excuse. I suddenly began to wonder why he’d tried to reach me. Hadn’t he made the kind suggestion to head straight back home after getting back to Korea? Why’d he call? Was there a problem with the report I’d sent him from Japan? Even though I tried to rationalize his attempt to reach me by telling myself he’d call back or send me a text message if it was an urgent matter, it was far from enough to suppress my concern.
“That bridge isn’t the only place I’ve been avoiding. I haven’t stepped inside a big department store for a while, either,” the driver said, picking up where he left off.
“Why is that?”
I had a hunch of what was to come when he mentioned “department store,” but I played dumb once again. I was a Japanese man on a business trip after all.
“I was waiting at a pedestrian crossing right across from a department store located in the heart of Seoul when the entire building suddenly came crumbling down. I was on my way to meet with someone at the food court there.”
I could sense the emotion welling up in the driver’s voice, as though he’d been reminded of just how narrowly he’d managed to avoid the clutches of death.
“It seems the traffic light saved your life.”
“No. The light had already turned green and was just about to go red again when it happened.”
“Why didn’t you cross?”
“I’d been vacantly staring at the department store and suddenly got the sense that something wasn’t right. I couldn’t bring myself to take a step forward. It was like something was grabbing onto my ankles. I wasn’t aware that all the building’s ventilation units had been moved entirely to one end of the roof. I learned about it later. Apparently, some residents living in the apartment buildings nearby had already complained because they couldn’t get their clothes to dry outside as a result of all the moist air coming from the cooling towers on the roof.”
I vaguely remembered claims about the collapse having been caused by unreasonable structural changes brought to the building while it was still in construction, but the story about the cooling towers didn’t ring a bell. In any case, I was struck by my driver’s sensational account of the events, which seemed to be grounded in his intuition. If he was telling me the truth, this man had been bestowed with a special blessing at birth. And if he’d made the whole thing up, he was an outstanding storyteller. But something was bothering me. He didn’t show any anger at the human ignorance and corruption responsible for such a man-made catastrophe. I couldn’t detect any hint of outrage in his voice—not even a single grunt.
“It was one of those hot, muggy days when going outside feels like you’re walking into a steam bath. I still find myself wondering—what in the world kept me from crossing on that green light?” he said, putting his sunglasses back on.
Perhaps even major catastrophes like this one can only be remembered through one’s senses and emotions. The first thing that comes to mind when I hear the name of that ill-fated department store is the image of my mother impatiently stamping her feet as she tried to get a hold of my aunt who was unreachable. Even scarier than the thought of my aunt having met a tragic end was witnessing my mother completely losing her mind because she couldn’t shake off the ominous feeling that was gripping her. My aunt had gone to the department store to have a look at wedding rings put on display for a promotional event.
My mom’s fears turned out to be unfounded. The whole incident happened after my aunt had placed an order for the wedding ring she’d wanted and then left the building. She’d witnessed the collapse of the department store from a café across the street as she shared a red bean shaved ice dessert with her fiancé. As one would expect, she never saw that wedding ring again.
It was almost uncanny how my aunt never uttered a single word about what happened on that day. Since my aunt kept silent, my mother had to find her own way of coming to terms with the tragedy that had unfolded right in the heart of the city. My mother believed the incident had something to do with my aunt quitting her respectable job and calling off her wedding, never to meet another man again. More than her wedding ring, my mother seemed to think it was my aunt’s good fortune that had been buried under the pile of concrete that day.
I came to see things differently from my mother after I’d watched a documentary on survivors of the World Trade Center collapse who’d only managed to escape death by a hair’s breadth. One man who’d walked out of the building complex right before the first airplane came crashing into one of the towers said he’d spent countless nights trying to figure out a logical explanation—why had he been where he was at that moment rather than still in the building? He tried to break away from this primitive fear of the inexplicable that had taken over him. Yet no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t arrive at a convincing conclusion. And it was exactly that, he confessed, even more than the fact he came so close to dying, which spooked him the most.
If the taxi driver’s story stemmed from the same kind of psychological tension, then perhaps the fact he seemed to be exaggerating wasn’t relevant. Even so, something still wasn’t sitting right with me. It was because of how he’d recalled the whole incident. I’m talking about how he used this tragic event, which stole the lives of so many people, to make himself appear special—like he was some kind of exceptional survivor.
“Weren’t there actually three survivors?”
I put the emphasis on the word “actually.” It wasn’t just because I felt irritated by his air of self-importance. I was already angered by having had to spew a bunch of nonsense to my superior, and I wasn’t happy that I was being made to feel responsible for this whole misunderstanding even though it was the cab driver who’d caused it in the first place. I was also trying to regain control of the conversation.
“How do you know that?”
“It made the headlines in Japan as well.”
“Oh, did it?”
“One of the survivors was asked what it was that he most wanted to eat right after being rescued, and his answer was ‘iced coffee.’”
“Really? That’s interesting.”
I wasn’t sure if he meant that the story itself was interesting or if the fact that I knew such a story was interesting, but either way it was enough to flatter my ego. By shifting my perspective, I’d managed to break out of the limitations imposed on me by having to pretend I was Japanese—which was a splendid feat.
The iced coffee story wasn’t something I’d made up. I vividly remember asking my mother to make me a glass of iced coffee after listening to the interview. I could also recall the taste very well. When I told my mother it tasted like plain sugar water, she knitted her brows and said it was because she’d forgotten to add in the milk. I crunched on an ice cube and asked myself this question: What would I be craving if I’d been buried in a pile of rubble for over ten days?
“Because of that news story, iced coffee sold like crazy in Japan at the time,” I said.
I’d made that one up. After all, one good lie deserves another. Elated by the driver’s reaction, I regained the boldness I usually displayed in the dim lighting of a night club.
“Oh, really? I was really craving some sikhye.”
“Pardon me?”
“Ah, it’s a sweet traditional Korean beverage made from fermented rice.”
“I see. But when was this?”
I felt like I was allowing the taxi driver to take back the reins of the conversation, but I couldn’t help it. My own curiosity was to blame.
“The June twenty-fifth conflict . . . I think it’s known as the Korean War abroad, right?”
“Are you talking about the war between the two Koreas?”
“That’s right.”
“Yes, that’s what we call it.”
I was wondering what kind of unfortunate event he would bring up next, but the Korean War? Really? I couldn’t imagine the kind of story he was getting ready to pull out of his hat this time. It felt like a very distant topic to me compared to the other events we’d discussed earlier. How should I put it? It’s like it completely transcended the boundaries of my imagination. It felt strange to hear of an event I’d only learned about in history books directly from the mouth of someone who’d lived through it. I suspected he’d picked this particular topic on purpose, knowing full well I wouldn’t be able to pretend I knew much about it.
“I grew up in a port city called Heungnam in North Korea. It was completely leveled to the ground by American air raids during the war. I remember the sky being pitch-black from all the bombing. I was so frightened by the bombarding that I got on one of the American tank landing ships pulling out of the dock at Heung-
nam when the U.S. troops retreated south. I knew that the air strikes would start again the moment North Korean and Chinese soldiers moved in. There were even rumors about the possible use of an atomic bomb. I got onto an American ship because I feared the American bombers. It was the same for everyone else. All we cared about was making it out alive. Thankfully for me, the roads leading into the city were all blocked, which meant only people from Heungnam could get on the ships. As you might guess, the number of heads allowed on board was limited.”
“That’s dreadful.”
Whether that was what the taxi driver had intended or not, I didn’t have much to say in regard to our new conversation topic. He was talking about something that had occurred quite a while before I was born. In fact, before even my father had been born. Although my grandparents were probably alive at the time, it didn’t make much of a difference to me. I wasn’t particularly curious to learn more about this strange war in which the two sides fought each other to death only to retreat back to their original geographical boundaries.
“I still don’t dare taking the subway. I absolutely detest caves. Whenever we’d hear the roaring of war planes, we had to run for cover into these caves that had been dug out near people’s homes. And even that wasn’t enough to safeguard your life. Tons of people died as a result of these caves collapsing. Had I not been holding a hand plow at the time, I don’t think I would’ve made it.”
“A hand plow?”
“From some point on, people started taking hand plows with them whenever they ran for cover into the caves. It’s because we’d have to dig our way through heaps of dirt to come back out. Not to mention your bare hands would leave you helpless in the event the cave collapsed. Dead bodies recovered from piles of crumbled dirt almost always had missing fingernails. Hand plows were considered really precious at the time. Anything made of iron was requisitioned for making weapons.”
The driver’s voice sounded surprisingly composed. He no longer exhibited any tinge of boastfulness and didn’t seem to pay any attention to me, either. He seemed solely focused on finding the remnants left behind on the trail of his memory. It made for a mood that was all the more dramatic. I couldn’t imagine how it must’ve felt like to hide under the ground knowing that you risked being buried alive. I was at a loss for words. It would’ve struck me differently had he just said he took refuge somewhere carrying water and emergency food supplies. Fabricated or not, some stories carry trivial yet fascinating elements that have the power to expose the harsh realities of life. That was the case with this hand plow story. To be honest, that’s also why I couldn’t completely shake off all my doubts. How should I put it—it’s like I had a growing desire in me to go and take apart all those pieces of the puzzle that had fallen right into place.
The story about the hand plow didn’t end there.
“My mother would always give the only hand plow we had to my older brother. As the eldest son, she said he was responsible for carrying on the family line. Had only one of us been able to get aboard one of the retreating American ships, she would’ve picked him without a moment’s hesitation. But my older brother didn’t get that chance. He never made it out the cave that collapsed over him following a bombing raid. I was the one holding the hand plow that day. I felt it was unfair that only my older brother got to hold the plow, so I’d snatched it from him . . . In order for one to survive, someone else had to die. In a way, I guess you could say survivors are also murderers.”
Was it because he spoke in such a subdued tone? Or because I was too absorbed in his story? It was only after he’d stopped talking that I realized the words he had been mumbling were not Japanese, but Korean. My hands turned sweaty. The air inside the car was turning hot and stuffy. Heat radiated from the driver. It was as though he’d pulled his heart out so as to show it to me.
The man reached for the bottle of mineral water sitting in the cup holder. I removed the cap and handed it over to him. He said thank you. He was speaking in Japanese again. He brought the bottle to his lips and began gulping down the water. I swallowed dryly. My throat was completely parched but there was nothing I could do other than passively watch as the contents of the plastic bottle emptied out before me. I couldn’t bring myself to ask the driver to keep a sip for me.
Before I knew it, we were approaching the four-way intersection near Gimpo Airport. We’d need to make a right turn if I wanted to go home, but I didn’t say a word. Perhaps I felt weighted down by the secrets we’d accidentally ended up sharing. All I knew for sure was that for the first time since getting on the taxi, I now regretted having pretended to be Japanese.
The man dropped me off in front of the domestic terminal and left. He didn’t forget to wish me a good trip in Korea. In the end, I’d failed to reveal the truth to him. Throngs of people came and went past me with hurried footsteps, but I stood motionless as though I’d been frozen in place. That is, until another taxi pulled up right in front of me.
The cab driver lowered the car window and asked me where I was going. He spoke Korean this time.
Translated by Léo-Thomas Brylowski
