Han Bong Hui is a Korean medicine doctor
who runs a center called the “100 Years Oriental Medicine Clinic” in
Ilsan, Gyeonggi Province with her husband, Jeong Il Kyeong. Both doctors
originally from North Korea, the couple met in South Korea and spend time volunteering outside of work, striving to set an example for others.
“I crossed over the Tumen River on April
2nd, 1998. Thinking of what it was like back then, I can’t believe I have a life like this, raising three children with my
husband. I cut through the river just as the ice was starting to melt,
shivering in the cold,” Han recalled.
She eventually arrived in the South in
2001, but only after three agonizing years hiding out in China and Cambodia,
waiting for the right opportunity to make it to South Korea. While she was able to stay with relatives in China, this small comfort was constantly dwarfed by the overwhelming anxiety that she would be exposed and repatriated.
Han graduated from university in 1997 back
in North Korea, promptly propelled into a bleak reality beyond the orbit of school. The nation was mired in
economic hardship and a nationwide famine–companies and factories were on
the brink of shutting down , if they were operating at all. “I couldn’t help asking myself why the
reality was so different from what I had learned in university about the
superiority of socialism. Why did we have to starve every day?” she asked herself. This disillusionment with the state and the
country’s deteriorating conditions prompted her to escape.
Following in her mother’s footsteps as a doctor
“My sister, me, my younger brother, and my
parents were all eventually able to escape to live together in China. Being
together as a family was good, of course, but it made us all the more
vulnerable to detection,” she said. These fears became a harrowing reality when the entire family was suddenly caught by Chinese security forces. Han’s
parents swore to the officials that the children were not biologically their own,
claiming to have pulled them off the streets. “In the end, they only took
away our parents,” Han said, tearing up.
Time does little to heal this wound, Han
said, acknowledging that she will never forget the desperation of two parents willing
to make the ultimate sacrifice to save their children. Han miraculously met another defector who used to live in
her hometown, but the most she could glean from him was that her parents had been shipped off to a
prison camp–to this day she has no idea if they are still alive.
“My parents always told me when we were in
hiding that if we managed to get to the South that I should start my studies
from scratch. Despite the inevitable difficulties it would entail, they
were resolute in the fact that I would need to be able to stand on my
own,” she said. As soon as Han arrived in South Korea with her sister and
brother, she vowed to do everything in her power to fulfill her parents’
request and honor their incredible sacrifice.
After her release from Hanawon, the
defector resettlement center, Han began searching for ways to realize this goal,
deciding to begin studying for university again. “I considered
a lot of different majors but decided to follow in the footsteps of my mother
and become a doctor. Both my mother and sister were doctors, so it was a field
that I was familiar with,” she explained, adding that she had already been
exposed to a variety of medical practices: in the North, doctors typically
practice a fusion of Korean and Western medicine.
A partnership is born
Settling on a path and starting over again
was difficult enough, not to speak of finding the means to do so. Fortunately,
help came from another defector to whom she was introduced through her sister.
This man, already studying Korean medicine to carry on his father’s profession,
would eventually become her husband, providing her with everything from
encouragement to help understanding the complex material covered in her prerequisite classes.
State stipends covered Han’s tuition at the academy preparing her for entrance to university but left little for general
living expenses. Han recalled subsisting mostly on instant noodles, bread, or
skipping meals altogether at times, feeding off her drive to succeed instead.
“One of the students that I met while I was
studying was a pastor. I later learned he was studying so that he could do
volunteer work in the future. After he learned that I was from the North, he
helped me a lot. He bought me notebooks and a sitting mat. He also gave me
50,000 KRW each month to use for my books. In the beginning I couldn’t
understand why he would want to help me for no reason and no reward,” she said. “In North Korea, the word ‘volunteer’ and its meaning don’t really exist. I kept trying to figure out what he wanted from me.
It was only later that I came to understand the true meaning of volunteering.”
His support continued on after Han entered university in 2003, unwavering even once she married her
husband, who also expressed his external gratitude. “He
helped us until I graduated. My wife and I learned so much from him. It made us
decide we should help others out and share with people once we settle down in
society,” Jeong said.
The couple opened their clinic in August
2011. It was hard in the beginning, getting all the administrative work in
order, but after a rough initial year, the couple has found itself in a
comfortable groove, happy to be working hard together every day toward a common
goal.
“We go out volunteering once a month with
the Rotary Club that we joined,” Han said. “We usually go to welfare centers or nursing homes to examine the
elderly and give them acupuncture if they need. They say it makes them feel
better and really enjoy it. I also help them dye their hair or give them
massages and chat with them. I learn so much about life by listening to their
stories,” she said.
Jeong added, “My
wife and I both studied on scholarships. So in the future, we want to support
students who are in need. Just like the pastor did, and also as my father did,
we want to follow in their footsteps and share the warmth we have with
others.”
*This article was made possible by support
from the Korea Hana Foundation [the North Korean Refugees Foundation].
