Your Republic Is Calling You

by Young-Ha Kim

  He was born in 1963 in Pyongyang. But when he came south, he was given the name and identity of Kim Ki-yong, a man born in 1967. The real Kim Ki-yong, an orphan, was born in Seoul. When he was seventeen years old, he left the orphanage and disappeared, and his identity records were expunged. What happened to Kim Ki-yong, the man who lent him this shell? Sometimes he dreamed that the real Ki-yong came back. A man with an erased face stood at the head of his bed. Even though he never said anything, he could tell that this was the real Ki-yong.

  In the spring of 1985, he went to a government office in Yongsan and renewed Kim Ki-yong's expired identity card, got fingerprinted, and received a brand-new card, assuming the identity of a man he'd never met. The North Korean mole stationed at the office was a dejected middle-aged man, not the young man impassioned with revolutionary fervor Ki-yong had expected. After the conclusion of their official business, they drank coffee in the hallway. The man addressed him in a nonchalant tone, "So you made it. I thought they had forgotten about me." He didn't seem all that pleased with Ki-yong appearing out of the blue. His tone was curt and rude.

  "What do you mean 'forgot'?"

  "It's been a while since a customer came by." The man glanced at Ki-yong. He stubbed out his cigarette in the sand on top of the trash can. "I've been meaning to go up but haven't had the chance."

  "Do you still have someone over there?"

  "Yeah."

  "Who?"

  "My mother lives near Sunan district in Pyongyang and my uncle is probably in Chongjin."

  "I hope you'll be able to visit one day."

  The man hawked and spat into the ash can. "If I go now, after all of this, will I be able to live happily? Is that possible?"

  "What?"

  The man's mouth twisted and he smiled as if to say, What does a kid like you know? He sighed. "Nothing. Good luck." He crushed the paper cup in his hand and tossed it in the trash can, then headed back into the office. He looked like a man who had seen all of his dreams and hopes sputter and managed only to survive, powered by the few drops of cynicism left in the bottom of his fuel can. Ennui dripped down his pant legs with his every step.

  For Ki-yong, who had just graduated from the Operations Class of Kim Jong Il University of Political and Military Science, commonly called Liaison Office 130, the man's defeatist attitude was surprising. How could he live in enemy territory without being alert? How could he let go of his animosity toward the South, where the great enemy Chun Doo Hwan massacred thousands of people in Kwangju in broad daylight? Later, he realized the South specialized in lifelessness and defeatism. Indiscriminate weariness was prevalent. Ki-yong knew what ennui was, but this was the first time he personally observed it. At home, it was an abstract idea batted about when criticizing capitalism. Of course, there was ennui back home, too. But in a socialist society it was closer to boredom. And it was really a matter of inadequate motivation; a bit of stimulation could change the feeling of boredom. But the prototypical capitalist ennui Ki-yong encountered for the first time in the South was heavy and voluminous. Like poisonous gas, it suffocated and suppressed life. Mere exposure to it prompted the growth of fear. Sometimes you encountered people who inspired in you an immediate primal caution, something that made you say, I don't want to live like that. That civil servant in the office had this effect on Ki-yong. He represented depression, emptiness, cynicism. Unattractive and dressed shabbily, the man triggered a feeling of discomfort in Ki-yong even though they spent only a few minutes together.

  Ki-yong ended up seeing him again years later, in a completely different situation. It was the summer of 1999. A man wearing a red cape stood on a small wooden box in Chongnyangni station, screaming. The cape was embroidered with a black cross with a gold border, which made it look like a college cheerleading uniform from far away. Sweat trickled down his face and black flies buzzed around his head. Ki-yong stood in place, staring at him for a long time. The man had changed immensely. He was thinner and his eyes were glowing. In a reverberating voice, he boomed that the end of the world was near. How did the spy steeped in ennui become an eschatologist? Had he really become one? Frozen in the square, which was crisscrossed by prostitutes, cops, college students, and laborers, Ki-yong gawked at the former spy turned religious fanatic. But the man didn't recognize him. When Ki-yong approached him, he was handed a pamphlet describing the end of the world. It was crudely laid out, studded with excerpts from the book of Revelation.

  Ki-yong asked, "Don't you recognize me?"

  The man glared at him. Without answering, he turned away to preach to another person. Ki-yong tugged at his arm. He looked back at Ki-yong, annoyed, and tossed back, "What? You think I'm crazy?"

  "No, I met you once in Tongbu Ichon-dong."

  The man's face tightened slightly. "What's the use? None of it matters. Read the pamphlet. We will soon be beamed up. That day will come soon."

  Feeling a little abandoned, Ki-yong started to leave the square. The man got off his box and trotted after Ki-yong. "I do know who you are."

  Ki-yong stopped.

  "But it doesn't matter. I discovered the secret of the universe. Before, I was just frustrated with life. But I knew, as soon as I received the Holy Spirit, that everything about this life was useless. I was fooled. Look at the faces around you. See any happy faces? They're all kicking and struggling and living each day like pigs. Why? Because they don't know why the world exists. That's why they keep walking on aimlessly. If they knew why, they wouldn't have to wander. You just have to walk the path pointed out by our Lord."

  His harangue wasn't coming to an end anytime soon. Ki-yong interjected, "So you're saying that before this year is over, people will be beamed up to the sky from their cars and their empty vehicles will fall off the overpasses and the people left behind will want to be dead, howling in pain?"

  "They'll regret being born as a human."

  "How do you know that before you even experience it?"

  The man pointed at his ear, small and ugly like an unshapely gourd. "Do you only believe in things you see? I heard with this ear here. The Lord told me. Listen hard. Our Lord speaks only to those who listen." He climbed back on his box and cleared his throat.

  The end of that year was not met with bodies being lifted to heaven. The New Year began with thirty-three citizens ringing the bell in the Bosin Pavilion, just like every previous year. Despite the millennium bug, planes didn't plummet to the ground and trains didn't derail. Nuclear power plants didn't break down and satellites didn't malfunction or accidentally launch nuclear missiles. Ki-yong thought of the red-cloaked man when he saw on the news that an assembly of 166 churches was to take place, for the devout to pray as the world ended. What happened to the man betrayed both by the revolution and Armageddon? And to all the people who congregated in the 166 churches? Why didn't they take their own lives when it became clear that the world was not coming to an end? Could Armageddon be held at bay that easily? But soon, everyone quickly forgot the large signs saying PERFECT PREPARATION FOR Y2K that hung on tall buildings in Kwanghwamun. Nobody thought twice about the millions of people around the world who barricaded themselves at home with generators and basic necessities. Of course, some people reaped profit from fear. One trillion won was spent in South Korea alone; even more was spent in the United States and in Europe.

  Fear and greed propelled people to act at the end of the century. It was trepidation of the unknown, not of war or disease or riots. It sounded scientific that a four-digit number starting with a 2 would shove the world into chaos, but shamanism was at its core. Ki-yong wasn't affected at all by the anxiety that reigned in those days. Maybe it was because a stranger's identity cloaked him and his world was tangled with codes. Or maybe because he grew up ignorant of the Christian worldview. In any case, he didn't think a god of catastrophe and destruction, if one existed, would appear in that way. Why would he come at a predetermined date? A true disaster would march forth from the unknown, like Burnham Wood attacking Macbeth's castl
e. The way Basho's haiku popped up on his screen this morning.

  Ki-yong sweeps the items on his desk into his black Samsonite briefcase. Song-gon isn't back yet. He stands up and strides out of the office. With an electronic whir, the door locks automatically behind him. He looks back. A small green light blinks above the keypad. Next to it is a well-known security company's logo of a fine mesh web, connected in sharp angles. He heads to the subway station. Dark clouds billow between buildings, wending along the wrinkles of the city. His car, crouched and still, observes him walking away. Ki-yong encounters more people the closer he gets to the subway station but nobody looks at him. He isn't a man who stands out. Lee Sang-hyok at Liaison Office 130 instructed, "Erase yourself until your alias becomes your second nature. Become someone who is seen, but doesn't leave an impression. You need to be boring, not charming. Always be polite and don't ever argue with anyone, especially about religion and politics. That kind of conversation always creates enemies. You'll slowly fade. From time to time, you'll feel your personality straining to get out from within you. You'll ask yourself, Why should I let myself disappear? Practice and practice again so this question will never present itself in your mind." According to Lee Sang-hyok, repetitive and conscious training, similar to that followed by a Zen monk in eliminating egocentric images, would allow one to reach a point where one could fully erase oneself. It was similar to working on one's golf swing. By relaxing the shoulders and eliminating unnecessary movement, one can swing more gently and efficiently. A spy's mindset and actions can be modified, too. In that sense, Ki-yong was the descendant of Pavlov and Skinner.

  "Why do people remember you? Because you annoy them. If you're partial to a loud tie or unusual accessories or have exaggerated gestures, people notice you. Seasoned spies aren't easily caught. Even neighbors who lived next to them for years don't remember them when the police come knocking on their doors. A police sketch becomes a faint outline of an average face. Good spies are like ghosts. People don't notice even if they tap-dance in the street or do the butterfly stroke in the pool."

  Ki-yong knows that people have warped ideas about what a spy is—Mata Hari, sex appeal, infiltration and escape tactics, extremely tiny cameras, bribery and appeasement, threats. In truth, all the information gathered by spies is already out in the open. Spying is similar to clipping newspaper articles. The quality of the information culled by spies isn't any better or worse than that. Information covers the sky in a black mass, like migratory birds in early winter. No, Ki-yong thinks, that is too menacing an image. It is more like a flood during rainy seasons, sweeping away objects in its path—a cow trying to swim, a chest door inlaid with mother-of-pearl, a pregnant Berkshire sow, red dirt-filled water bubbling up, timber from a pine tree, the corpse of an impatient hiker, Styrofoam buoys. Ki-yong and his colleagues' assignment was to pull out meaningful information from this flow of facts, then analyze it. Because they read endlessly and organize what they learn, they are as academic as any scholar. It was no accident that the spy Chung Su-il, also known as Khansu, became one of the most renowned scholars on the history of exchanges among civilizations.

  The most important asset for a spy isn't the ability to infiltrate or disguise oneself, but to possess an acute sensitivity, an ability to discern the crux of the information from the common barrage of words. Near the end of World War II, a famous spy received an order from the KGB to report on the German army's deployment. He went to a blanket factory near the Austrian border and asked them all kinds of questions, posing as a blanket seller. By figuring out where the blankets were going, he could piece together the positions held by the German army. The German army's movements were as clear to him as if he were looking at tropical fish in a tank. Most information is not stored in steel safes deep in cloistered rooms, protected by infrared detectors. All the words coming out of someone's mouth and all the written phrases in public documents—these are the crucial clues.

  Ki-yong goes down the subway stairs. A beggar is prostrated on the steps, his forehead resting on the floor and his hands outstretched. He holds a sign made of a cardboard ramen box, the letters written forcefully in black marker. The pen strokes, strong and desperately drawn, shriek in sorrow: I GOT NO LEGS. Ki-yong passes him by, but then doubles back and drops a 500-won coin in his cup. Unable to lower his head any farther, the beggar bends his back and sticks his rear up in the air in gratitude. It is the first time Ki-yong has ever been charitable. From the entrance above, a strong wind pushes into the subterranean tunnel. A sour smell hits his nose, wafting from the beggar and his dirty cloth backpack. Ki-yong runs down the stairs.

  BART SIMPSON AND CHE GUEVARA

  11:00 A.M.

  UNDER CHOL-SU'S direction, the Passat gently hops the sidewalk, turns elegantly, and backs into the parking space in front of the showroom. Ma-ri likes guys who can park gracefully. Good drivers tend to show off, but a man who knows how to park has a delicacy about him and an ability to concentrate.

  Chol-su bids Ma-ri goodbye as he gets out of the car. "It's a nice car. I'll give you a call."

  "Please do. Bye."

  He gets into his Grandeur and turns on the engine. Ma-ri enters the office. The manager nods in greeting as Ma-ri says, "I'm back."

  Another dealer, Kim I-yop, who started working there a year after Ma-ri, smiles brightly and greets her. "How'd it go?

  "I didn't see you this morning," Ma-ri comments.

  "Tong-il was sick."

  "Oh ... So how is he?" Ma-ri regrets her question as soon as it escapes her lips. There is a brief silence.

  "Oh, you know. Same as usual." I-yop smiles. His son has malignant lymphoma. Once, I-yop brought him to work, and the kid grinned from ear to ear, so excited to see all the sparkling cars in the showroom. I-yop placed his son in the driver's seat of a car worth more than 100 million won, and the boy happily honked the horn. The year the boy was diagnosed with malignant lymphoma, he was shuttled around to take all sorts of tests. One day, his wife's car barged over the center divider, crashing into a one-ton truck. The airbag didn't deploy and she died instantly. But emergency personnel found the two-year-old fastened in his car seat, smiling, without a single scratch. The insurance company refused to pay out in full because her car had breached the divider, and I-yop sued. The company apparently thought his wife was trying to commit suicide and that she'd purposefully shot over to the other side of the street. It was a plausible theory but nobody knew for sure. When I-yop was at work, his wife's unmarried older sister looked after the boy. Once, he confessed that he would be taken aback at the sight of her when he got home, thinking for a second that his wife was standing there. Well aware of his situation, his colleagues sometimes give him credit for their contracts, which he doesn't refuse. Judging only from his cheery surface, one can't begin to guess at the depths of misfortune that sprang on his family. At times, his cheer feels a little creepy, like the optimistic beginning of a horror movie. If someone came up to her one day and exclaimed, "Kim I-yop hanged himself last night," Ma-ri wouldn't be all that surprised.

  Back at her desk, Ma-ri takes out her cell phone and double-checks the text message she received earlier that morning. Her body starts to burn up, the way it does when she soaks in the tub. Heat travels up in waves from deep within her. She will see him in one hour. They will eat together and she will stare at his lips moving delicately as he chews. Ma-ri touches her face with her hands. Her hands are cool on her hot cheeks. I'm almost forty. What am I doing?

  KI-YONG BUYS A ticket and pushes through the turnstiles. Although his credit card doubles as a public transportation card, he consciously chose to purchase a single ticket. A while ago, Ki-yong bumped into a JoongAng Ilbo film critic at a movie screening. He told Ki-yong that he'd gone to some screening at Seoul Theater in Chongno. When the critic returned to his office, his phone rang. The person on the line identified himself as an employee of a messenger company, and asked him where they should deliver a package.

  "Do you know where Hoam
Art Hall is? JoongAng Ilbo? Come to the lobby and call up," the critic said.

  "Wait, are you a reporter there?"

  "Yes, why?"

  "Do you know Park Hyong-sok?"

  "I'll give you his number. You can call him directly."

  "No, it's okay. I'm actually with the Namdaemun Police Department."

  "What?"

  "This is Detective Hong, Namdaemun Police Department Crime Division. Park's on this beat."

  "What's this about?"

  "We just want to ask you a few questions. Were you at Chongno sam-ga today around 4:00 P.M.?"

  "Yes."

  "Did you see anything out of the ordinary?"

  "I don't know, I just went to a film screening."

  "Oh, I see. Which movie was it?"

  "Why do you need to know that?"

  "Oh, never mind. Thank you."

  "What's this about?"

  "There was a murder right near there today. We're just asking around, so you don't need to be alarmed. Thanks for your cooperation. We should go grab a drink with Park one of these days," the detective said politely, and hung up.

  The critic started wondering how the detective knew he had been in Chongno at that time, how he found his phone number, how he knew where to reach him but didn't know anything else about him. He had frequented police stations when he covered metro, so he was pretty familiar with the way the department worked, but he couldn't wrap his mind around this mystery.