by Young-Ha Kim
The Liberation Day motorcycle rally began just before midnight. Jae texted everyone the meeting point, which was the symbolically important Gwanghwamun district, the center of government. Groups from neighborhoods such as Noryangjin, Bulgwangdong, Ttukseom, Gurodong, Sangamdong, Sangbongdong, and Wangsimni headed for Gwanghwamun. The gathering was already enormous. People could see the bikes leaping out recklessly from alleys left and right and merging throughout the city. Jae’s crew, which had started out east from Noryangjin, ran into another crew of twenty around the Dongjakdong neighborhood.
“Where you coming from?” asked Gas Tank, who was riding in front. He got his nickname because he delivered canisters of LP gas from house to house.
“From Seosan!” someone yelled.
“From where?”
“Seosan in Chungcheon province. You don’t know Seosan?”
Jae’s crew sped toward Banpo Bridge, following the group from Seosan, who had left there at nine-thirty. The front guard went first and blocked traffic at the intersections so Jae’s crew could race ahead without stopping for lights.
Some crew members in their twenties, who had completed their military service as drafted police, headed straight for the traffic panel box at intersections and manipulated the lights. At every few intersections they ran into patrol officers, but they ignored them. The sight of the fatigued officers only boosted their morale. A succession of modified bikes darted out and followed them. It was clear they hadn’t just been out riding and by chance joined the rally. They kept hollering from bikes dressed up with gadgets and flashing LED lights. It was a festival that some had anticipated for a long time, a parade.
That night Mokran showed up on her Kawasaki. She maintained a steady interval between her and Jae throughout the rally, and I kept them in sight as I rode behind. Since new bikers who didn’t understand our planned signals kept squeezing in, the rally began more slowly than normal.
“How many you think’ll show up today?” asked Seesaw Eyes, who was riding right up against my bike. He was an old friend of Gas Tank and had run with Jae’s crew for a long time.
Gas Tank predicted, “From the look of it, maybe a thousand?”
Seesaw Eyes said, “Hell, I’m practically shitting myself.”
Jae sent Seesaw Eyes, who was too excited to stay back, to cover the front. Jae kept watch on the rally behind him while posting guys at each intersection. When Seesaw Eyes parked his bike and kicked the rearview mirror off a honking Audi, the driver got scared and cowered in the car.
When the crew received several reports that police barricades had nearly blocked off Gwanghwamun, Jae immediately changed the meeting point to the Jongmyo entrance. The number of text messages exploded. As Jae crossed Banpo Bridge, a gust of wind blew off the yellow flag that had been hanging on his bike. For the first time since leaving Noryangjin, the rally halted. Someone sprinted out and grabbed the flag, which had caught on a rail, and fastened it firmly back in place. No one considered this ominous. They were all still too young to believe in omens. The line of bikes started moving again. The police at each checkpointtried to move the physical barricade farther down, but they couldn’t shut down heavily trafficked bridges yet. The sound of thousands of motorcycles spitting out exhaust could be heard from two kilometers away—like bees buzzing in their hive.
The other bikers cleared a path as soon as Jae’s motorcycle appeared. Those of us who’d followed Jae continued racing after him. It took over twenty minutes for the thousands of bikes gathered at Jongmyo to depart. The guys’ shouts and the girls’ shrieks blended with the roaring engines and blaring horns. Around the Jongno area, cars waited to join the rally—the so-called car-pok on standby. As if escorting the motorcycles, they lined up to the left and, with their emergency lights on, moved forward. Tow trucks, delivery trucks, and compact cars driven by former motorcycle-crew members stuck close to the bikes.
People returning home late watched the bikers with exhaustion and awe. A major motorcycle rally was no different from a typhoon—you heard rumors of its approach everywhere. Everyone began anticipating it, but no one knew exactly when and how it would hit. If you were lucky, you would steer clear of it without trouble. And even if you ran directly into it, it was difficult to grasp its full scope.
The front guard now operated intuitively. Without receiving orders to do so, the front and rear guards took turns blocking the flow of traffic. There were a few patrol cars present, but they were kept back so far away by the sheer mass of bikes that they could only look on. Motorcycle crews now controlled the city. Frightened people who didn’t dare catch a taxi watched the members with loathing, and cab drivers losing business during their busiest hour shouted curses like “I hope your head breaks open and you spend your life a vegetable, asshole!”
The massive rally continued throughout the city’s main streets. Alarmed when woken by the roar, many people called 112. Then around one in the morning, the police force shifted tactics. The barricades started to come down, and the traffic officers began to round up the front guard.
We ran into the motorcycle club near Mapo Police Station. They showed up at the back of the motorcycle rally. At first we assumed they were just another bike crew joining in, so we immediately made room for them, but we quickly realized that they weren’t following the leader’s orders or the unspoken rules of the rally. These heavyweight, high-horsepower motorcycles forced their way to the lead, where Jae was. The riders couldn’t have been more different from us, with their black leather clothes and their bikes done up in bright colors. As soon as someone in the crowd shouted, “The assholes are cops!” our line of motorcycles scattered. Some approached the motorcycle club while brandishing iron pipes. When a weak 100cc bike suddenly wedged itself between the large motorcycles, a BMW and a Harley-Davidson wobbled and flipped onto the pavement. The other club members got scared and tried to retreat, but it was hard to escape the stream of oncoming bikes.
Jae saw the chaotic scene behind him as he rode over a hill. Sensing that something was wrong, he slowed down and returned to the rear. He shouted, “What is it? What’s the problem?”
Someone shouted at Jae, “Fuck, it’s the cops.”
“Shake them off,” he said.
Just then, a Harley-Davidson went full throttle toward Jae. The guy riding it said, “Hey, you’re Jae, right?”
Jae looked in the Harley’s direction. “Who’re you?”
“You don’t know me? The Harley cop. Lieutenant Pak Seungtae. I’m Lieutenant Pak. You don’t know who I am?”
The rear of the motorcycle ranks was becoming increasingly disorganized. The front seemed to be facing trouble too, and the rally was losing speed.
“Who?” asked Jae.
The thunderous sound of motorcycle engines and horns made talking impossible, but Seungtae continued shouting. The only thing Jae heard over the noise was “cop.” The crew members near Jae surrounded Seungtae. Mokran and I were a little ahead of Jae. When I looked back, Gas Tank had come up from behind Seungtae’s Harley and was kicking the bike’s tail with his foot. Jae accelerated and escaped ahead. Some bikers were aiming their iron pipes at Seungtae’s back and head, but his Harley rode low and wasn’t easy to overturn. He slowed down and dodged their attacks.
Jae headed south; we had stirred up the downtown area as much as possible. He picked Gangnam as the next destination since law enforcement had been lax there, so far. But the police response was escalating; the patrol officers formed a line and pushed the rear guard aside. They began cutting off the rally’s tail.
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After Jae’s massive rally passed through the area, the only people remaining were motorcycle club members. Their attack on the run had failed, and some of them had damaged their motorcycles. Ambulances raced in and carted off the injured. Seungtae parked his overheated Harley, squatted on the pavement, and watched the roaring mass move farther away. His lower back throbbed from the pummeling he’d received.
The dermatologist’s BMW stopped near h
im, and he asked Seungtae, “What are you doing? Did you get hurt?”
“No, I’m fine.”
He got out of the car and offered Seungtae a cigarette.
“I don’t smoke.”
“They’re a bit frightening, seeing them close-up like that.”
“It’s because they’re fearless. How do you win with guys who aren’t scared of dying?”
Seungtae had also been afraid. When the pipe had come down on his back and head, he’d been helpless. Thankfully, the kids had been steering their bikes while attacking, so the hits were softened. Still, if he hadn’t instinctively lifted his arm and blocked them, he might now be rolling on the pavement. Within the police force, Seungtae held the most moderate views on the bikers. He had opposed cracking down on them because he knew too well that catching hundreds, no, thousands of them wouldn’t stop them. His theory was that the largest crews would slowly shrink in number with guidance and preemptive crackdowns, and after that, controlling them with traffic laws would be sufficient. Above all, Seungtae knew that they weren’t the scum they were made out to be on the Internet. When you actually met them, they really were just kids. Innocent and easily frightened. If they received a text that scared them before a large rally, many didn’t even show up.
But Jae was different. Normally when Seungtae approached a boy, even if he was a leader, he would shrink back. He would be intimidated just by the fact that a police officer knew his name. But Jae’s crew had actually attacked Seungtae, and they had shrugged off an attack by heavyweight motorcycles.
This kid was dangerous.
Over the past few months, Seungtae had collected more information on Jae. He now knew where Jae was born, how he had grown up, and his current living situation. Seungtae had spoken to the director of the orphanage and received relevant documents, and had even more paperwork concerning Jae piled up on his desk. He’d recently acquired evidence suggesting that Jae wasn’t just a rebellious kid but someone with ambitions toward political and spiritual leadership, like Malcolm X.
It was no easy task leading thousands of motorcycles across the city. You needed an animal’s instinct and an intimacy with the city’s roads and sudden curves, and, on top of all this, you needed to anticipate police action. Jae managed to accomplish all of this with basic methods like flag and hand signals and text messages.
Seeing Jae close up, it was hard to continue thinking of him as a teenager. Even Seungtae, who had encountered countless numbers of gangs, felt awe the moment he approached Jae and the yellow flag attached to his pitiful 125cc bike. The baptism of steel pipes that had flown at Seungtae directly afterward felt like the punishment he deserved for being disrespectful. Of course that feeling faded as soon as he left the rally. It was like waking up from a spell. An unbearable emptiness replaced admiration; it was like an emotional hangover.
“Block them at the Han River, you bitches!” Shouts from the National Police Agency situation room nearly burned out Seungtae’s walkie-talkie. Commissioners with ranks and names he didn’t know were yelling at him while watching the CCTV images transmitted on screen.
“If they reach Gangnam, just wait and see what happens to all of you!”
His superiors kept repeating that the motorcycle rally must be stopped, clueless about its size. It was three or four times bigger than any motorcycle rally Seungtae had known. Even if you cut off its tail, the riders merely took detours then rejoined the main body. Jae had kept security tight up to the rally, and then once it began, lithely crossed the city, which he seemed able to read. It was enough to make you suspect that someone was helping him by watching the road conditions from a control room.
Seungtae drove down to the Itaewon neighborhood where a task force was on standby. Itaewon was a strategic area in Seoul where foreign forces were stationed. The Qing military had based itself there during the Sino-Japanese War, and after the Korean War, the American army did so as well. From here, you had a bird’s-eye view of the Han River, with easy access to both north and south.
As soon as Seungtae joined the Special Response Team, he sent a text message: “Which bridge will they cross? That’s all I need to know.”
A response came promptly back: “Hannam.”
He asked Pyo, “Where are the kids right now?”
“They’re in Daehangno.”
“Then we’ve got less than ten minutes. It’ll be Hannam Bridge. Tell them to set up a barricade. Divert the traffic, and block Banpo Bridge. Dongho Bridge too.”
The task force members drove to Hannam Bridge. One squadron of the conscripted police force had already arrived on the scene.
Seungtae hustled to the front. “In groups of two, attack with batons. Go at them from both sides. They’ll slow down around this point, so don’t be scared to just pull them down. There’ll be a bike with a yellow flag attached to it—don’t let that guy get away. He’s a wanted man. He’ll be up front. Catching him is your goal. Whoever brings him in gets a bonus vacation, commissioner’s orders.”
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Jae took the lead as they headed toward Hannam Bridge. The traffic officers waiting near Namsan Tunnel Two aggressively cut the rally off in the middle. Because they attacked from the front, they nearly ran into Jae’s bike. But Jae avoided the patrol cars with his dazzling maneuvers, then emerged up front again. He looked back at the patrol cars. About a third of the bikers had been marooned by the police, but Jae didn’t stop. He continued toward Hannam Bridge. He probably thought the cut-off group could join again later. He stopped the ranks of bikes still behind him on the Hannam Bridge overpass.
“What is it?” Mokran asked me.
“Look at that. There are cops all across the bridge. It looks like Jae’s trying to turn the group around.”
“But some are already crossing.” Mokran said, pointing at the Oksu neighborhood. The motorcycles cut off by the police were now detouring toward Oksu. It was clear that they would make it south to Gangnam by crossing the Dongho Bridge. As if Jae had made his decision, he signaled to those behind him with a wave of his flashing baton, meaning, Go at top speed and break through. For if they backed off now, the only ones remembered would be the group that made it to Gangnam’s Tehran Boulevard.
“What has to happen will happen,” Jae said, and raced to the front again.
Mokran and I hesitated before following him. The rest of the group whooped as they trailed after Jae. The police had set up a barricade of triangular cones across the Hannam Bridge’s entry point, but Jae swerved onto the sidewalk to avoid it.
He had no idea that there was a reward on his head. Some police tried to stop him, then retreated. When the car-pok saw the barricade, they halted, but over a thousand bikes continued to race after Jae and head for Hannam Bridge. Jae didn’t know this, but Seoul’s entire traffic police force was gathering around that bridge.
To Jae, the cones that the police often used for barricades were symbolic obstacles. If they were truly annoying, you could just get off the bike and move them. The waiting police headed straight for Jae. He eluded them in any way he could, followed by hundreds of bikes that had also detoured around the barricade of cones. In the ensuing chaos, the conscripted police fell into total panic. The rally’s front guard, driving cars, had gotten out to clear the barricade for the others. Then they began fighting with the police.
When the barricade was finally cleared, around a thousand bikers honked their horns and charged across the bridge. Confronted by the tsunami of motorcycles, the young policemen—simply fulfilling military duty—became terrified and retreated to their checkpoint. The car-pok waiting at the shoulder of the road started moving again. The rally triumphantly passed Hannam Bridge and sped toward the Yanjae main road. There was nothing blocking the way to Tehran Boulevard.
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Pyo watched the scene unfold. He said listlessly to Seungtae, “They got through.”
“The next meeting point must be Tehran Boulevard. The kids that crossed Dongho Bridge and the ones that crossed Ha
nnam will merge and turn the area inside out,” Seungtae said while checking a text message. “Now they’re saying, ‘Bitches, stop them at all costs!’”
Outbursts of anger had started up again in the control room. Seungtae turned down the walkie-talkie’s volume.
Pyo asked, “What do we do?”
“They’ll return north across the river for sure,” said Seungtae. “They’ll end where they began. Maybe Jongno or Jongmyo or Gwanghwamun. Those are good places for them to break up later because of all the possible escape routes and alleys. Even if we can’t get many of the kids tonight, at the very least we’ve got to get that guy Jae. If we don’t manage to get him this time, he’ll grow even stronger and by the next Independence Movement Day, we’ll have an even more uncontrollable number of bikes creating havoc.”
A new order came through on Seungtae’s walkie-talkie. He made his disapproval clear, saying, “That’s too dangerous. I can’t be responsible for that.”
So many orders were coming from different places—the chain of command itself needed traffic control. If problems surfaced, whoever had been at the scene could end up taking the blame. Soon the final order came in. Seungtae conveyed it to his subordinates, who asked the same question he had. Who would be held responsible if something went wrong?
A report came in that the rally was now heading north. Seungtae already knew which bridge they would cross. Seongsu. They could be taking Yangjae Highway north, but at a certain juncture they would have to shift and cross Seongsu Bridge. Once again the police set up a barricade.
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As before, Jae didn’t take the police barricade seriously, but as he approached Seongsu Bridge from the south, he saw that this one was different. It was the first time the police were using the steel-spiked barricade on the motorcycle gangs. Jae had never seen or heard of it—one of the limitations of being an eighteen-year-old leader.