C’mon now, just listen for a second! I mean, hear me out. Let’s say this is the shoeshine stand, and this is the taekwondo studio.
He set two janggi pieces on the board with a loud clack. Tomak’s master bent over without thinking, to get a closer look at the board, and instantly Jaesup was on his feet and driving his knee into the master’s face. With a puck! we heard his nose break, and he staggered at the sudden attack. Jaesup grabbed his hair with both hands and drove his knee into his face over and over. Tomak and the two other boys he’d brought with him could only stand and stare, too caught off guard to react. Jaesup dragged the master, now passed out and bloodied, by his armpits and dropped him at the edge of the hill.
Call the cops on me if you want. But when you move into someone else’s neighbourhood, you better play nice, you piece of shit. You think it’s a game, with those little buddies of yours? Behave yourself and stick to teaching taekwondo, before someone decides to burn that studio down.
With that, he kicked the limp taekwondo master down the side of the hill like he was kicking away a rag. The master rolled and slid until he came to a stop face-down on the road. He never budged.
Word of what happened spread instantly, not only through our neighbourhood, but across the three-way intersection to the neighbouring village as well. The scandal grew: people were saying that he’d lost ten teeth top and bottom, that his nose had caved in, that he spent eight weeks in the hospital. A detective from the local police station came to see Jaesup and Jaemyung. The taekwondo master ended up losing even more face, for not only losing a fight but also telling the police.
Witnessing all of this made me think about how cutthroat life can be. I figured that our tiny hell was a miniature version of the world outside. By the time I started my third year of high school, I was absolutely certain that I had to decide on a path for myself, that I had to fight my way out of there. I’d started noticing girls around then, too, but I concentrated solely on studying for the college entrance exam, determined to get out of the slum any way I could.
By the time I figured out that nearly all of the boys in the neighbourhood had a crush on Soona, the noodle-house girl, I was already deeply in love with her. The first sign was when Jjaekkan took over the chore of filling the water jar at his house. When I praised him for being so diligent, the shoeshine boys all glanced at each other and snickered.
Jaemyung said, Why do you think he’s doing it? He just wants to get a look at Soona.
Of course, I thought. The public tap was right next to the noodle house.
Then Jaemyung went to the noodle house himself and glued a movie poster from the Hyundae Theatre on the door and presented Soona with a pair of movie tickets. And according to Jjaekkan, Tomak was going there every couple of days to buy noodles. I’d noticed that they were eating more noodles than sujebi at Jaemyung’s place, but had thought it meant they were making more money than usual. Even Myosoon seemed to notice the change in her brothers, because she threw a fit one day, crying that she wanted to go to school, too, like Soona.
Every now and then, I’d spot Soona in the distance while going to or from school, and sometimes we ended up on the same bus together. One day, I boarded the bus to see her sitting right in front of me. She offered to hold my bag as I stood. I smiled bashfully and nodded, but didn’t say a word. Maybe it was because we were the only two students in our neighbourhood, but she wasn’t shy about striking up a conversation with me.
Oh, you got this from the North Seoul Library, she said.
One of the books had slid out of my bag.
You go there, too? I asked happily.
Of course, that’s where I check out my books …
We ran out of things to say after that. Once we got off the bus, we’d be in the market and would have to pretend not to know each other. As our stop got closer, I started to get nervous.
So, uh, I began. I’m going there on Friday. Would you like to go together?
After school? What time?
Around 4:30?
Sounds good.
The library was about halfway between my school and Soona’s school. It was open until six, which gave us ample time. As luck would have it, it rained that Friday. I deliberately left the house without an umbrella just so I could share hers. She and I hung out together a few more times after that, and during the few free months we had after the college entrance exam, I often invited her to hang out with me downtown. Strangely enough, my memories of her from that time are all jumbled together and disconnected. But I guess that’s only natural, since I’ve been living in a different world in the decades since.
4
The morning begins with a cacophony of sounds, each one scrambling to outdo the other and setting my nerves on edge. I doze off during the lull in customers and jump in alarm at the sound of the door opening. The noise of passing cars, which I usually don’t even notice, fills my head. I’ve been getting so little sleep lately and running around so much during the day, what with rehearsals and preparations for opening night that it’s harder than usual to get through the hour of overtime. Each time I shake my head to chase away sleep, I feel like I’m poking a beehive, like a swarm of bees is flying around my skull and blocking everything from sight. Whenever I feel this completely exhausted, I think about Kim Minwoo of the black shirt. For a while, whenever I saw a guy on the street walking along in a black shirt and baseball cap, my stomach would sink, and just the sound of a pizza delivery scooter could make my insides churn with nausea. I remember how he introduced himself to me for the first time. Hi, I’m laid-off. What? I said. Your name is Laid Off? What kind of name is that? I laughed at my own joke, but he didn’t react in the slightest and simply repeated, No, I mean I was laid off.
I met him while working part-time at a pizza place. It wasn’t one of those things where you fall for a customer while serving them pizza. He worked there, too. Other than the manager, everyone who worked there was in their twenties, but he stuck out. He looked older than the others, like the guys who appear at the start of a new college semester after having been on leave to complete their mandatory two years of military service. It turned out he was thirty-one, and working as a delivery driver. He always wore a black shirt. The text or pictures on the front varied, and the sleeve length and thickness changed with the seasons, but otherwise it was black shirts all year round. I’m pretty sure I was the first to ever ask him why he wore only black. His answer, as always, was simple: Because I hate doing laundry. So the employees all took to calling him Black Shirt instead of Minwoo. But he and I weren’t that close when we worked there. We may as well have been strangers.
I guess the manager saw that I was healthy and energetic because he immediately put me to work helping out in the kitchen. I wasn’t allowed to make the dough, but I took care of the toppings and prepped the ingredients. I messed up a few times by mixing up orders and was immediately put on probation. That meant my hourly wages were docked for three months. I’d heard that even part-time jobs were supposed to come with employment contracts, but the manager had never mentioned one, and I let the matter go because I assumed it was just common practice to pay your workers as promised. I memorised all of the pizza recipes in the first month and waited patiently through the remaining two months of probation. Then, in the fourth month, I got my paycheck and saw that I was still on probation pay. When I asked the manager about it, he said that I’d inconvenienced him by taking two days off in the middle. I said, okay, but wasn’t docking 300,000 won from my pay a little much, and he countered by threatening to extend my probation. I was powerless. A single adult living in Seoul needs 1,600,000 won to get by; I was barely making half of the 1,000,000 won I’d been promised. That meant my hourly wage was only 3,000 won.
As I was arguing with the manager and on the verge of quitting right then and there, Black Shirt stopped me. He asked the manager why he’d never offered me an employment contract and pointed out tha
t it was illegal not to do so. He checked off the things the manager had done wrong: if there was a three-month probation, then I should have been informed of that when I was first hired, and once the probation period was up, I should have been paid my full hourly rate. But the manager claimed that it was not his fault and that I’d accepted the conditions, and proceeded to ignore us. Black Shirt slowly took off the uniform top printed with the store logo and said he was quitting, too, and that he would report the manager to the Ministry of Employment and Labor and to the neighbourhood Employment Information Centre the very next day. The manager snorted and said, Knock yourself out, and just like that, he and I both quit.
Since then, of course, I’ve pretty much given up. As long as the work and the hourly rate are reasonable, I don’t argue. The convenience store only pays 4,500 won an hour, though in my case, I should be making time and a half because I work the night shift plus overtime. Also, if I work a five-day week, I’m supposed to get an extra day’s worth of pay for working on my day off. But instead I agreed to a flat 60,000 won for a ten-hour graveyard shift. In exchange, I get paid in cash at the end of every shift. Just a few years ago, I would never have stood for such injustice and would not have been satisfied until I’d quibbled over every little thing, but now the thought of doing that just seems like a bother, so I settled for a reasonable compromise.
A few days after quitting the pizza place, I was in the middle of a rehearsal at the theatre when I got a message that someone had come to see me. It was Black Shirt. He gave me a ride in his ancient Galloper jeep with its noisy engine back to the pizza place. The owner was waiting to hand us envelopes filled with 300,000 in won. I cracked open the envelope and gave the bills a quick count, then folded it in half and started to shove it into my back pocket. Black Shirt grabbed it from me.
You make it too easy for someone to steal it. Put it in your bag.
I was excited about the sudden windfall and couldn’t bring myself to just walk away after what he’d done for me, so I said, Let’s go celebrate!
He looked around and led me to a place nearby that served blood-sausage soup. As we walked inside, he muttered, Girls these days have a lot of growing up to do.
I asked how this miracle had transpired. It turned out that he hadn’t reported it to the Ministry of Employment and Labor or to the Employment Information Centre. He knew all too well that, despite the laws, not only would they not bother trying to get such a small amount of money from the business owners, they would never even notify them. Instead, he had a friend call the manager and say in an intimidating voice that the company had been hit with charges and ask why the manager was causing problems. Then, he made a picket sign the size of a door, printed with large block letters, and stood in front of the pizza shop, from the lunchtime rush all the way through until dinnertime. At last, he was contacted by the pizza chain owner himself, who was usually at another shop. He said the owner came in person, looked into the situation, and offered a settlement. He told me the next time I took a job, even if it was for part-time wages, I had to make sure I had an employment contract. That it was the only way to ensure the length of my employment, my working hours, my job description, and the appropriate wages.
Within the week, he helped me find a new job at a coffeeshop near the university. He told me he used to work for a large construction company. After losing his job there, he’d been getting by on two or three part-time jobs at a time. I met up with him now and then. Usually, he came to see me as I was getting off work, and when the play I was directing opened, I invited him to the theatre. We were becoming such good friends that other people started mistaking us as a longtime couple. But we both knew that neither of us were in any position for fooling around or dating, and so we maintained an unspoken but careful distance. There was definitely a vibe between us whenever we were alone, but we both ignored it and just enjoyed each other’s company. Sometimes, when we met over soju to gripe with each other, I’d get a sudden urge to cry, and would stare at the words or picture printed on the front of his black shirt then make a quick joke to change the subject.
He’d graduated from a junior college and was exempted from military training because he was the sole provider for his widowed mother. After completing a period of public service instead, he spent the next eight years working at one job, but was kept on a temporary contract and was never offered a permanent position. To me, he was an older, wiser friend who knew the ways of the world. My other friends, who were the same age as me, looked like children chasing mirages, which was probably why he always seemed so much more mature and grown-up. At first, I knew nothing about his family or friends, and I didn’t ask. I thought maybe he didn’t have any proper friends. I was the same in that regard. The people I knew in the theatre world were all actors and directors; once work was over, we returned to our separate, private lives and only met again on the stage. It was a fantasy world that had little to do with my real life.
Despite having attended a junior college, Black Shirt was no better off than someone who’d only finished high school. Considering that even people with MAs and PhDs were having trouble finding jobs, his lack of steady unemployment was unsurprising.
He started out as a day worker, but lucked out by catching the eye of a field engineer and landed a temporary gig in a construction company. He helped with managing the building materials, construction workers, and the eviction crew, and worked very hard at it. But at the end of each year, he had to sign another contract allowing him to work for another year, all the while being treated differently from the permanent employees. He could not look forward to any paid vacation or educational or welfare benefits, and his pay was only half that of the salaried workers. Naturally, there were no bonuses or incentives either. At company dinners, he had to walk on eggshells and sit there and eat quietly, unable to join the conversation, and he was never welcome at the round of drinks that followed.
He’d never been very talkative, but a few months before it happened, he started growing even quieter. Usually, I chattered away while he listened. Actually, more often than not, he just sat there blankly. And yet I never felt uncomfortable eating or drinking or working with him, because he was so sensible, and because he made no demands of me, and because he never acted like he had to prove himself to me. I felt as free with him as I did when I was by myself. Once, I bumped into colleagues from the theatre while out drinking with him, and introduced him as a cousin. As soon as the words were out, I started to feel like he really was a cousin that I’d grown up with.
*
As rush hour approaches, the convenience store gets busy. There are the customers who come in just for canned coffee, office workers who swig energy tonics and grimace like they’re hungover, young people who slurp their ramen cups at the counter against the window, the ‘lunch-boxers’ who come every single morning to buy pre-packaged meals, women who stop in on their way to work to grab a sandwich and a drink. At exactly 9 a.m., the owner comes to relieve me. Though he had an extra hour of sleep thanks to me, he comes in puffy-faced and looks all around the store. I take off my apron, put on my backpack, and wait quietly in front of the counter. After checking to be sure nothing is amiss, he counts out 60,000 won and hands it to me.
Don’t be late tonight.
I’m sorry again about yesterday.
I remember then that today is not only our final rehearsal but also a Friday. After tonight, I am off work for the weekend. At this time of day, all of the buses headed downtown are packed, whereas the buses leaving the city are mostly empty. I doze off the moment I sit down. But my eyes open automatically once my stop is near.
I am walking up the steep road lined with dreary brick rowhouses when I get a text message.
Heading home? Bet you’re exhausted. You said opening night is tomorrow, right? If I can’t make it then, I’ll go the next day. It’s been a while. Miss you.
It’s from Minwoo’s mother. I pause to send a
reply.
You must have just left for work. I’m almost home. Sooo tired. :( Give me a call when you’re able to come, and we’ll go out for a drink after the show. :)
I start to head down to my basement room, but pause and go upstairs instead. Studios line each side of the hallways all the way up to the third floor; the fourth floor is where the landlord and his wife live. He is a retired civil servant, and she is always warm and kind to me. I ring the bell. She sticks her head out the door. She knows where I am coming from at that hour. I take out the 300,000 won and hand it to her.
I’m two months behind, right? This is for one month. I’ll give you the other month after the show is over.
She clucks her tongue.
It’s not healthy for you to live this way, working at night and sleeping during the day … It shows in your face. Are you eating three times a day at least?
Of course. Just trying to make ends meet, you know.
I give her a faint smile and turn to leave, but she calls me back.
Hang on, I have something for you.
She hands me a jar of homemade mustard leaf kimchi from a batch that was sent to her from the countryside. The smell makes my mouth water. I thank the landlord’s wife, she asks if I have enough rice to eat with the kimchi, and, our greetings complete, I slowly head back downstairs and stand before the door to my dark, semi-basement room.
5
Choi Seungkwon called me at the office to tell me about a meeting for the Asia World project and a lunch with Chairman Im of Daedong Construction. I wasn’t interested, but I couldn’t exactly get out of it either, as the opening of the Han River Digital Centre was still a few months away. Besides, while the chairman and Daedong Construction’s financial problems and alleged corruption had made the papers more than once, the reality was that the entire construction industry was going through a slump. The Asia World project had been through at least two different project management companies and changes of government administration, and was still not done. Up until I took over the designs for the Han River Digital Centre, Chairman Im had shown no interest in or knowledge of the project. Maybe Seungkwon had finally brought it to his attention. Seungkwon was the younger brother of Choi Seungil, one of my old college friends.
At Dusk Page 6