by Young-Ha Kim
As soon as he opened his eyes, the terminal rushed in as though approaching him. Then two men bumped into him as they passed.
At age sixteen, Jae is now in Daehangno.
The streets are flooded with people who move steadily without taking much interest in their surroundings. They focus only on the brightly lit window displays and the crowds approaching from the opposite direction. Like robots equipped with delicate sensors, they head for their destination without bumping into one another. But if a person takes an interest in the environment—if he picks something up from the ground or stops and looks around—he disrupts the flow. In this case, most detour around the obstruction and rejoin the moving mass of people, forgetting the obstruction was ever there. But the homeless aren’t like that. They are the streets’ residents, so their interest lies in the streets themselves. They stay alert to everything happening around them. Just as a stray cat perched on a brick wall watches other stray cats, they recognize one another at once. Jae realized this immediately when he started his vagabond life.
In the Daehangno area Jae merged with the crowd and watched b-boys dancing onstage. The young dancers strained to demonstrate how high and brilliantly they could shoot up and defy gravity. The girls shouted in response to each pose, and their cheers came back in the form of even more extreme dance moves.
Jae had once dreamed about becoming a machine. In the dream he realized that he had to live on as a machine and accept this fate. For some reason he was unaware of it while it happened, but by the time he came to his senses, he had already become the machine. Maybe scenes from the movie RoboCop had influenced him. When he realized what had happened, he didn’t feel unhappy and instead was impatient to test the machine’s capabilities since he might be able to fly or break through a wall with one blow of his fist. But in the dream he wasn’t able to move at all. When he was about to go mad from frustration, his body began moving with dizzying speed and mechanical regularity, but was still controllable. It moved to its own pattern.
As he watched the b-boys spinning on their heads like tops, he recalled the dream. It was as if elaborate mechanical parts made up their bodies. As if several machines he could watch but not control were getting tangled up in their dizzying movements. Jae felt helpless and stepped back, landing squarely on the foot of someone behind him.
Before he stepped on Mokran’s foot, she had already noticed him. This boy was different, she must have thought, for he was wearing a fuzzy knit sweater and watching the dancers like a mathematician puzzling over a difficult formula. Like he might be gathering his strength to confront the explosive energy on the stage.
“It’s okay,” Mokran said when Jae apologized. She grabbed him as he tottered. “You feeling sick?”
Jae shook his head and looked up at her. As soon as she released his arm, he stumbled again, barely recovering his balance.
“How many days is it?”
“How many days of what?” At first he didn’t understand her question.
“How many days is it since you left? I mean, since you left home.”
It was three days, if the orphanage could be called home. But Jae didn’t respond. Together they left the semicircle that had formed around the stage to sit on a bench in the shade of a ginkgo tree. Some drunken observers shouted as they passed. Mokran offered Jae a cigarette, which he accepted and lit.
“How many days is it for you?” Jae asked.
“Well, I just come and go.”
“I’m Jae.”
“Jae-hui? Isn’t that a girl’s name?”
“No, Jae. Not ‘hui,’ but ‘ae,’ as in ‘two.’” Jae made a V sign at her with two fingers.
“What’s your name?”
“Mokran.”
“That’s a strange name.”
“You’re one to talk!” Mokran giggled. “My dad, he thinks he’s hot shit. I guess he wanted to stand out.”
Her last name was Yeom. Yeom Mokran. It definitely wasn’t a common name for girls these days.
He said, “It sounds like a name out of a textbook. A name of an independence movement leader.”
“It’s the national flower of North Korea.”
“Your father named you after North Korea’s national flower?”
“Yeah. My birthday’s July sixth, and that day there just happened to be an article in the paper about North Korea’s national flower. Something about how the mokran was the flower that Kim Il Sung first discovered. My dad has a soft spot for the North. He’s probably still in Pyongyang.”
“Is he in politics or something?”
“No, he’s in the movie business. I heard he’s directing TV commercials in the North these days.”
Mokran rattled off some titles of movies that her father had produced. Even Jae had heard of one of them.
“It’s fucking embarrassing.” She drew on the ground with the toe of her shoe.
She told him about her father—an incurable skirt-chaser. Even after three marriages, he couldn’t manage without a mistress. Mokran’s mother was his second wife; Mokran had four brothers with different mothers. Her own mother had remarried and was living elsewhere, so Mokran and her father’s other children were left in the custody of his third wife. Her stepmother was a lawyer, and she often pulled all-nighters at the office. Not long after this latest marriage, one of the stepbrothers, the first wife’s oldest son, molested Mokran while she was asleep. After her father found out and nearly beat the boy to death, the son ran out of the house and stole a car parked in front of a restaurant. Around four in the morning he crashed into seven parallel-parked cars and was arrested by the police. He had been driving drunk without a license, and the taxi driver pursuing him was injured and hospitalized.
“In English my name’s Mulan. That’s what it says on my passport too. Did you see the movie?”
Jae nodded. He had watched Disney’s film about the girl in ancient China who, disguised as a man, went to war in her father’s place.
“To quote my father, mine’s the perfect name for the global age, and for the approaching reunification of North and South, something like that. Easy to pronounce in English, comprehensible in Chinese, a name the North Koreans would like . . . All bullshit, like a leopard changing its spots. His daughter’s out begging for food on the streets and he’s going on about the global age? ‘Joseon Homeless Kid Yeom Mokran.’ Doesn’t it have a nice ring?”
She laughed, then said, “You’re kind of different.”
“Me? I’m pretty ordinary. You seem more different than me.”
“No, you’re the different one. You’ve got a way of seeing inside people. It’s like I’ve been found out.”
He shook his head. “No, I can’t get inside you.”
“You’re hilarious. What are you talking about? Get inside me? You an X-Man or something? An alien?”
“It’s like when I saw a tiger at the zoo. We were able to look deep into each other’s eyes, and for a short while, we understood each other. But when the tiger turned around and disappeared, it was as if it had never happened. I don’t know what you’re like yet, but for a minute there, I felt we understood each other.”
“I’ve never seen a real tiger. But you’re saying it’s a good thing, right? That somehow, we get each other.”
“Yeah. Me and people, we, well, how can I explain? I mean, it’s usually hard for me to connect.”
Just when Mokran was about to ask him what he did connect with, some b-boys showed up behind Jae. The concert hadn’t been over for long, and the dancer still gave off an overheated energy. They dragged him into the dark alley behind the cultural center.
“You ran away from home?” asked a short, stocky b-boy.
Jae said it was something like that. The same guy, maybe their leader, moved in closer. Jae thought fists might start flying, and tightened his stomach. The guy spoke to him in a low voice. Maybe it was the guy’s hip-hop-style clothes that gave Jae the impression, but even the way he spoke sounded like rap.
&nbs
p; “A lot of kids who come here have run away from home. Yeah, like you. I don’t know why they show up here, but they do. I guess they feel comfortable here. There’s lots of kids like them. Maybe our group members have run away too, yeah, I guess you could see it that way. I mean, we’re here day and night, killing time. Still, we haven’t really run away. We come since we don’t have anywhere else to practice. You know how much we practice a day? We crash in the same room, eat instant noodles, soaked in the smell of our sweat and stinking feet, all day long, yeah, sometimes we’re at it practicing over twelve hours a day. At school they call us problem kids. So we don’t go to school. Sure, a few of us’ve left home too. But we’ve got a place for all of us to sleep, we’ve got work to do. That’s how we’re different from you guys. You jerks run away and hang around without a plan, we don’t like you. If kids like you keep hanging around, the brass will come. They don’t see straight so, shit, they can’t tell the difference between you guys and us. They keep putting the screws on us for no reason at all. Fuck, they first say that we’re young and tell us to name our school. But we’re long past that. Some of us dropped out, others got kicked out. Anyway, that’s the way it is. Then the brass says they’re going to call our parents. Our parents know we’re b-boying, but even if they’ve given up on us, who wants to be called by the cops in the middle of the night? Why the hell do our parents have to show up late at night at the police station? We didn’t do anything criminal, and we didn’t run away or anything. But that’s nothing. Say you end up on PD Notebook or some news show like that. The board of education, city hall, the district office, the cops all show up and destroy this place. You guys can hang around for a few days, then bounce, but not us. This is our bread and butter. You get me?”
“You’re asking me to leave, correct?” said Jae.
“Right, that’s it. I didn’t say you should go home. You can beg, be a delivery boy, it’s your life. But don’t hang around here. This time we’re telling you nicely. Next time we won’t.”
Jae had just seen how strong they were. He was impressed by their one-handed handstands—bodies frozen in midair, supporting their weight without a tremor—and the drill position, spinning with such force that their heads seemed to dig into the ground. It was impossible to stand up to them. They looked about three or four years older, and Jae lacked their strength, brawn, and speed. And they were only trying to protect their turf. But one thing didn’t sit well with him. Why didn’t they push back against those stronger than them (the police, parents, and school authorities), instead of pushing around weaker, defenseless kids who had no one?
“I heard that hip-hop isn’t about being forceful with the weak and weak with the strong,” Jae said. “It isn’t just about spinning longer, jumping higher, or doing more powerful moves.”
Another b-boy stepped forward. He was a head taller than Jae. “If you’re going to say shit you picked up on the Internet about the spirit of hip-hop, forget it. It looks like you haven’t been on the streets long, so let me teach you something. If you’re just stopping by, it’ll seem like everything’s chill. There’s a stage and there are b-boys. A DJ, an MC, even an amplifier. Cool, everything looks peaceful and orderly, right? And there are girls cheering. But if you think this is the real story, you’re a fucking fool. Out here, shit, it’s a jungle. America? America’s great. Hip-hop? You heard how the oppressed blacks resist by spraying the hell out of alleyways with graffiti, and then meet to battle one on one, right? You can’t mess around with the blacks in America. There’s a lot of them and they’ve got political power. Us? Shit, teenage dropouts aren’t even human beings. If there’s a class issue in the Republic of Korea, we’re at the bottom. If they step on us, we’re stepped on. Resistance? Sure, resist all you want, you shit-talking asshole.”
He held up his right hand to Jae’s face. His index finger was shorter than the others. “I got my draft notice, so I closed my eyes and cut it right off.”
When Jae left Daehangno and headed down toward Dongdaemun Market, Mokran followed him.
“Those older guys, they’re like that to everybody.” Mokran tried to comfort him. “They’re good enough to enter international competitions, but if they so much as breathe wrong, the police or the media’s all over them.”
“I guess they leave girls alone,” Jae said calmly.
Mokran changed the subject. “You have somewhere to go?”
“Let’s say I was born where two streets meet. I’ll keep living on the streets, I’ve got a feeling.”
“Why’re you talking like a middle-aged man? ‘I was born where two streets meet’? ”
“I sound like a real clown, don’t I?”
“A little.” Mokran giggled. “Do you have a cell phone?”
“Cell phone?” Jae said. “No.”
She took his palm and wrote her number on it.
Jae studied his palm and cocked his head. “Aren’t you missing a digit?”
“The last digit’s three. Memorize it.”
From then on, Mokran equaled three to him. Even when he had forgotten her looks and her voice, the number three made him think of her and made an impact on him.
Jae said, “Can I use your cell phone for a minute?”
Mokran handed it over, and Jae began dialing.
14
I was on my way home from cram school when I saw Jae’s call.
Jae told me that he had run away from the orphanage and was in Seoul. I asked him where he was calling from.
“Daehangno.”
“That’s close to me,” I said. “Do you have somewhere to sleep?”
He said he had found a bathroom that kept the heating on at night. “I’ll need to be out before the older homeless men come in the morning to wash their hair.”
I told him to come to my house.
“It’s okay. Wandering suits me better.” He seemed worried that he’d be sent back to the facility. “I’ll call again later.”
“Are you calling on someone’s phone?”
“Yeah. Someone I met in Daehangno. But I’ve got to go now.” Jae hung up and returned the phone to Mokran.
“What did I say the last digit to my number was?” she asked.
“Three.”
“Good. Now you can go.”
Mokran saw Jae off. A drunk shouted as he crossed the park. Jae headed toward the city center, where he wouldn’t rile the b-boys. He needed to find a place to sleep. Though it was early April, the weather was still too chilly to sleep outdoors. He finally found an alley in the Central Market in eastern Seoul and squeezed himself into a small space between a restaurant supply store and a tableware store, where he stayed alert nearly all night. From somewhere he heard dogs, trapped and whimpering in a cage, waiting to be sold for meat. Like a muscle throbbing after a rigorous workout, his mind didn’t calm easily.
Jae learned from the b-boys that he was surrounded by the gaze of hunters, and that those hunters weren’t grownups but guys his age. Other similar experiences followed. If he so much as showed up, the others noticed him right away. No matter how quickly he tried to pass through, they recognized him. These groups had a frightening ability to spot solitary homeless boys and always banished them from their turf.
Drifting like this, Jae learned to collect coins from the slots in vending machines. He decided on a district, and all day long, he visited its machines. He stayed nimble and vigilant in order to stay under the radar of the maintenance people and other guys. He grew familiar with the traffic light intervals at intersections and the flow of traffic on the side streets. When he dug out coins, he used his left hand, as it was a bit smaller. He managed to earn around two to three thousand won a day this way, enough to buy a rice-and-vegetable roll at the market.
15
Jae used the last of his money at a cybercafé. It had been three weeks since he had been out on the streets, and the weather was terrible that day. He didn’t think he could bear another sleepless night in the spring rain, and older homeless peo
ple usually filled up the underground passages. He sat beside three guys his age who were huddled around a multiplayer game.
“Hey, you!” A guy wearing a grubby white hoodie called Jae over. He was the biggest of the lot. There was black fuzz above his lip that made him look even more grown-up.
“What do you want?”
“You ran away from home?”
“Something like that. Why?”
“You alone?”
“No, I’m meeting someone.”
“Bullshit, I know you’re alone!”
“Okay, fine. I’m alone.”
“Hey, this bastard says he’s alone,” said Hoodie to the boys beside him. He tapped Jae on the shoulder. “Wanna join us?”
He recognized the game they were playing, a strategy simulation game that he had once played in elementary school. He said, “I’m no good at it.”
“We just need you to make the teams equal.”
One of their team members hadn’t shown up; Jae ended up on Hoodie’s side against the other two. The game turned out to be fun. Hoodie was an excellent player and made up for Jae’s weaknesses, and though they ultimately lost, it wasn’t by much. During the game, Jae got a feel for who they were. As soon as the game ended, Hoodie stood up, grabbed his bag, and said to the other two, “Hey, let’s get the fuck out of here.”
Jae stood up. “Where you going?”
A guy wearing a New York Yankees cap told him off. “Why the hell do you want to know?”
Jae gathered his courage and warily explained that he was broke and had to leave the Internet café. If they had somewhere to sleep, could they put him up for a night?
Baseball Cap grinned. “We let the idiot into one game, and now he thinks he can hang with us.”
Hoodie approached Jae. “Will you be our slave?”
“Slave?”
“Don’t know what a slave is? It’s doing whatever you’re told.”
The three waited for his response. He didn’t feel like he had much of a choice. “Okay. I’ll do it.”