The Disaster Tourist

by Yun Ko-Eun

  The manager stamped harder than necessary on the cigarette he’d thrown to the ground.

  ‘You can’t disappoint Paul,’ he said.

  This project had covertly been under way for six months. Visitors were decreasing in number, and the resort had noticed uneasy signs of apathy from Jungle. Now Mui was creating its own story. Yona opened and shut her mouth, fumbling for words. She had to propose an alternative.

  ‘Manager, have you heard of Pai?’ she asked. ‘What about you, Junmo?’

  The manager shook his head. The writer didn’t know what Pai was, either.

  ‘It’s a small village in Thailand. Pai was originally a way station on the way from Chiang Mai to Mae Hong Son, but as travellers began to stay there for longer periods of time, it became the destination it is now.’

  ‘What’s there?’

  ‘There’s nothing in Pai. If you visit, you’ll see a lot of stores selling T-shirts with the sentence “There’s nothing to do in Pai” written on them. “There’s nothing special about Pai”, “Pai: do nothing here”: slogans like that. People like those slogans. The whole point is that there’s nothing to do. You can feel a sense of peace there. I bought one of the shirts, too. It said “Pai is all right”. Wearing that shirt, I spent a somewhat boring week there. But after I came home, I kept thinking about that somewhat boring week. I still dream about Pai. Most of the tourists who visit the town are entranced by its charm. What if you tried to create an environment like Pai’s here?’

  ‘Pai is Pai and Mui is Mui.’

  As the manager said that, he got up from his chair and looked out the window. It was quiet. Since things had come to this, Yona couldn’t help but ask the question she’d been trying to avoid.

  ‘How are you going to cause one hundred casualties?’

  That was nothing to worry about, they told her.

  Some people believe Heinrich’s Law: that before a disaster occurs, hundreds of small signs foretell what’s about to come. But Heinrich’s Law only focuses on the event, not the victims. Those injured in a disaster don’t have premonitions. To the victims, disasters come quickly. One day, the ground suddenly collapses beneath your feet: an incident too jarring to be a coincidence, too sad to be fate. How could one artificially create something like this?

  ‘Before I got this job writing Mui’s sinkhole story, I worked as a photographer,’ the writer said. ‘People are always taking photos of themselves in front of things, but the pictures are never very interesting. So I started to do the opposite, and for money, too. I would look at photos people sent me and recreate the scenes so they were more interesting. Once I got so many online requests, I couldn’t sleep for a week. People brought in cameras asking me to recreate their photos, they showed me room interiors to copy; in some cases, I redid graduation photos by casting similar-looking people to stand in for the original subjects. And now I’m working on disasters. The sinkhole’s not my first. Disaster and catastrophe aren’t just within the realm of the gods. Us humans, we can manipulate nature, too.’

  Junmo Hwang had only got this job because there was a demand for disasters. He wouldn’t reveal where he’d worked before, but he said no one ever found out that the disaster he’d planned was man-made. Don’t believe everything that happens in the world, he warned. Roughly three per cent of it was fake.

  ‘Are you not uneasy about what you’re doing?’ Yona asked.

  ‘Unease is like a pair of shoes, allowing the artist to go where he needs to go.’

  ‘But after the sinkholes occur, a lot of people will be investigating what caused them.’

  ‘The official cause will be foundation work on the tower. Yona, I’m not an amateur. Sinkholes happen when a layer of underground rock dissolves, or the earth is weak, or due to internal shock from something like an earthquake. They can also appear when groundwater dries up, or the land is parched because of a drought. I’ve come up with a cause that combines all of these issues. The tower. That tower is going to become our alibi. When construction on the tower began, it overwhelmed the desert. That’s what I mean. Even though the holes are man-made, they’ve grown a whole lot bigger than what we originally dug. Both in diameter and depth. We’ve been surprised by how smoothly work is progressing. Usually sinkholes happen in areas with a lot of limestone, but whether the ground here is limestone or not, it wasn’t that difficult to create the holes. Even if we stopped work on them now, I think they would keep growing. And then there’s the tower shooting up over there, looking like it might fall over. You can think of this project as half human, half created by the desert itself.’

  Yona thought about how sinkholes can eat up a five-lane road in five minutes. These two holes would swallow an entire village’s field day, like an enormous snake gulping down a frog the size of a house. Time was now flowing towards the event, like sewage sucked into a drain. The whirlpool had already begun. Yona had to decide if she was going to join in or run away.

  The manager opened a bottle of whisky and filled three glasses. He gazed at Yona’s glass and said, ‘I want you to help with this project, Yona. Do you know why I’m making you this offer?’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘It’s not just because you’re a Jungle employee. Of course it’s true that we need travel experts, but that’s not all. I’m asking because I was certain that you wouldn’t refuse.’

  Yona drank a sip of the alcohol to hide her strange sense of displeasure.

  ‘What I mean is, if you’d decided to go back to Korea—if you’d heard our plans and didn’t want to be a part of them—you would have left earlier. But you’re still here. That makes me trust you. I’m pretty good at judging people.’

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  ‘Don’t you have the authority to save Mui? You’re the person in charge of contract renewal.’

  ‘You’re mistaken to think that the contract will be renewed just because I give the okay. Jungle project organisers don’t have absolute power. This programme is going to fail no matter what I do. I’m sorry, but that’s the truth.’

  ‘What if there’s a new programme?’

  ‘A new programme?’

  ‘After the event occurs in August, we’ll start offering a new programme right away. It’ll be a complete travel package, set right here in Mui. It doesn’t matter whether it’s five nights and six days or five nights and seven days. Since you’re the expert in that area, I think you can create the perfect package, both for Jungle and for Korean travellers. What do you think about staying here, doing research and coming up with a new itinerary? If you prepare the trip beforehand, it will be good both for you and for your company. Jungle can unveil its new programme immediately after the disaster happens, when the island is still straightening things out. We need to coordinate the timing of our actions, before it’s too late.’

  ‘What will I get out of this?’ Yona asked.

  ‘You’ll have complete authority over this travel package. Our resort will only work with you. This trip will excite your boss, I’m sure of it.’

  Yona felt like a small hole had been drilled into her body, and the manager was peeping through the hole and looking at her insides. Yona had lost count of the number of times she’d dedicated months to a single project, only to have it fall apart or be taken away from her. This time, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to build up trust with local government officials and the partner hotel to ensure success. And no one would find out about her involvement in the creation of the sinkholes, would they?

  At Jungle, the first thing Yona did when she got to work in the morning was determine the location and intensity of disasters that had occurred overnight. She had to sort through newspaper articles, social networking sites, and press releases from international organisations. She’d spent ten years doing this. But during this trip, Yona had begun to feel like she’d lost direction. She grew anxious just thinking about the stories she’d tracked, and couldn’t get rid of a lingering attachment to the Jinhae package. Scattered remnan
ts of the city were probably spread across the ocean at this point, ready to be discovered. Yona hadn’t left behind a life in Jinhae, but somehow it seemed like fragments of her, too, were strewn across the Pacific.

  Yona thought about the employee who had preceded her at Jungle. She’d never seen his face, but she felt like she knew him better than anyone. It was because of the rumours. The man had submitted a resignation letter, but with Kim’s coercion, he’d decided to take six months off instead; after this person had departed, rumours about him echoed throughout Jungle’s office.

  ‘I thought Section Chief Park just kept his head down, but now he’s trying to quit.’

  ‘Really? I knew he was a bad seed. When he’s upset, he doesn’t just do things by half. All or nothing: that’s his style.’

  Considering that Park had handed in a resignation letter and the boss turned it into a trip, everyone thought that Park had won. But six months later, after he returned from his time off, Section Chief Park got the worst performance reviews in the office, and soon he was transferred to a branch everyone hoped to avoid. After that, Park wrote a real resignation letter. The employees who remained couldn’t stop gossiping about him.

  ‘It’s a predictable story,’ they said. ‘After six months off, it’s November, almost performance rating season. Team Leader Kim was trying to step all over Park. He needed someone to send to that prison, anyway. When people like Park turn in resignation letters, they’re sacrificed for those of us who wouldn’t dare quit. I thought it was strange when Team Leader Kim tried to convince him not to resign, but now I realise he was just using Park for his own gain. Isn’t he the kind of guy who’d do something like that? He squeezes the juices right out of people.’

  Yona was hired to take over Section Chief Park’s job, and even though the position had been empty for a long time, hints of her predecessor remained. Here and there, she saw the name Sungdong Park automatically filled in on planning forms, so she had to replace it with her name. She also got frequent calls that came out of nowhere and asked, ‘What was Sungdong Park like?’ Yona had a hard time grasping the speakers’ hidden intentions, or even determining who they were. Maybe these people worked for other companies where Sungdong Park had sent his résumé. Even though she didn’t know him, Yona replied like they were old acquaintances and confidently assured the caller that he was a good person.

  Yona felt the sudden urge to place a similar call to Jungle, to say, ‘Please give me Yona Ko from programme team three.’ What kind of answer would she get? Would a replacement already be sitting in her seat?

  Yona stared at the transparent glass of whisky placed in front of her and considered what lay behind it. She thought about the meaning of this trip. About the messages she’d got from Jungle, that they were ignoring the person in charge here: her. Yona had to accept it. It looked like Jungle had dealt with her in the same manner as her predecessor. You’d think that when normality unravelled, it did so suddenly, but the truth was that Yona’s sinkhole-like collapse resulted from several years of pressure.

  ‘Do you know what real disaster is?’ the manager asked Yona.

  Yona’s fellow travellers had said that the manager looked like a typical Mui person, but Yona didn’t know what a typical Mui person looked like. The manager’s skin was dark, but lighter than the other Belle Époque employees. His frame was much larger, too, and he often had an overbearing look. Like right now.

  ‘The days after the chaos unfolds,’ he said. ‘That’s when the living and the dead are divided once more.’

  He quickly returned to a soft, benevolent expression. Relaxing his face, he continued in a low voice.

  ‘What will save Mui more than anything is the real disaster that comes after the disaster. That part is your role, Yona Ko.’

  Fate can be determined by a single moment. Maybe the manager’s offer was an opportunity for Yona. Yona fiddled with her glass of alcohol. Of course, this could be a trap. But if it were Kim here, if Kim was in this situation right now, maybe he would have liked what was going on.

  The manager and the writer filled their glasses completely, and Yona filled hers halfway. The three drinks crashed in mid-air. A single sip of whisky warmed Yona’s insides.

  5

  THE MANNEQUIN ISLAND

  IT WAS EARLY IN THE OFF-SEASON, and there were no guests at the resort. Weather wasn’t good between July and November, so tourists’ footsteps disappeared from Mui during those months. Disasters didn’t distinguish between the dry season and the wet season, but things like precipitation, temperature and humidity mattered to the disaster tourist. The off-season had started just as Yona’s Jungle group arrived in Mui.

  Each morning began with a clear sky. As the day deepened into afternoon, heavy rain would fall, but at night, humidity and noise on the island vanished. Yona stood on her balcony, staring down at the sea and up at the sky. It looked like you could scratch at it with your fingernails, and if you did a layer would peel off, and then another identical layer would appear underneath. Wasn’t there a saying that only thirsty people dig wells? Mui was a thirsty island planning a huge scam to survive, creating holes out of nothing. The island’s situation resembled Yona’s, although it was significantly more dire.

  Things had changed in the few days since Yona had agreed to take on a role here. Her previously unresolved problems were now dealt with quickly. The first evidence of this came the next day, when a resort employee went to Ho Chi Minh City airport and brought back Yona’s suitcase. Of course, Yona still didn’t have her passport or wallet, but when she was reunited with her belongings, she began to relax.

  Yona wrote a contract to formalise the situation. By July, she would deliver the complete programme itinerary to the manager, and beginning in August, all business between Mui and Jungle would operate through Yona Ko. That was the gist of the contract. Yona decided she would remain in Mui until the first Sunday of August, but to stay here for more than a week, she needed authorisation. Yona had to secure written permission for a longer stay. Paul, it seemed, would grant her that permission.

  ‘It’s because Paul pays taxes to Mui,’ the manager said. As Paul had invested in Mui, it had gained an enormous amount of authority. The manager told Yona that he’d already applied for her residence permit, and it should arrive within a week. Yona’s first assignment was to explore the entirety of Mui, for research. The manager assigned an employee to help her with the task. It was the man Yona had given two dollars to: Luck.

  The manager offered them a car, but Yona forcefully declined. It seemed less stressful to ride Luck’s old motorcycle. Yona had forgotten until just now, but Luck had transported her back to the resort on this vehicle, after she’d witnessed the truck accident and right before she fainted. The motorcycle’s paint was peeling off in fish-like scales.

  ‘I couldn’t properly say hello the other day,’ Yona said bashfully. ‘Your name is Luck, right?’

  ‘Yes—you remember me.’

  ‘Do you know my name?’

  Luck shook his head.

  ‘It’s Yona Ko. I remember seeing this, too—the spelling here is wrong.’

  Luck’s face seemed to redden slightly. There was a Korean word on the body of Luck’s motorcycle, containing a letter that wasn’t exactly a but also wasn’t not a . A long vertical line stuck out from the top of the letter. Yona gestured the correct spelling with her finger.

  ‘This says kyeongchuk—celebration,’ she explained. ‘Do you know what that means?’

  ‘Is it something good?’ Luck asked.

  ‘Yeah, it is. Luck, your English is really good. I guess you know some Korean, too, right?’

  ‘I’m learning. I only know a little.’

  The manager described the route to Luck. Today’s plan was to visit the volcano and hot springs. As soon as she was handed the itinerary, Yona lightly crumpled the piece of paper in her hand.

  ‘I’ll decide where we go,’ she told Luck.

  They began on the road that
circled the island. Mui formed a long oval shape, longer from top to bottom than east to west. The road went around the entire island, but it didn’t always hug the coast. In some areas, the road veered inward, far from the water, so certain areas of interest weren’t visible. After circumnavigating Mui once, Yona and Luck left the paved road and turned on to a dirt one.

  As they drove, Yona couldn’t help but lean against Luck. She was reminded of what the man who’d taken her to Phan Thiet a few days ago had said. That you could tell the relationship between people riding a motorcycle together based on their posture. The man had told her that she was sitting like luggage; not a partner, lover or friend. She still didn’t know what it meant to sit like luggage, but she could tell that right now, Luck had tensed up just like her. When they drove on to bumpy terrain, he told Yona to grab him tightly, but as soon as Yona put her hands on his shoulders, he stiffened a little. On the paved road, Yona had been grabbing his shirt tails instead.

  As she clung to Luck, Yona realised that backs have faces. How strange that a single movement could make her, and someone else, feel so awkward. Yona had chosen this old motorcycle over a comfortable car because she’d thought for some reason that the motorcycle would be easier. Its tracks were lighter than a car’s, and with the motorcycle, the manager couldn’t intervene. If Yona had picked the car, maybe the manager would have come along, too. But now Luck’s back was making Yona feel strange.

  They reached the Unda house from Yona’s home-stay, shrouded in quiet. Yona didn’t see the school-house boat, nor the child who’d floated by in the plastic basin. The whole area stood at a standstill, like it was a movie set that operated only during business hours.

  But she did see one familiar child. A boy by the well. The well was familiar, too, of course, but it lay unused. The handwritten sign that the college student had stuck in the ground after the Jungle group finished their project, and the saplings that the teacher’s daughter had planted, were already gone. A perfectly fitted top covered the well, and to the side, a heap of earth and sand was piled up, like someone had decided to plug the hole again.