[imText1]Osaka, Japan — “My father and mother passed away leaving my younger sister and me. The fact that we survived the March of Tribulation as orphans seems like a miracle. We crossed the Tumen River, thinking that we could find something to eat in China, and it was a relief that we were not detected by the North Korean border guards. The fact that there is no place to turn back to seems to make a person stronger.”
Park Choon Shik and his younger sister Sun Hee crossed the border when they were 13 and 11 years old respectively in 1997. Choon Shik is now studying international relations in Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University and Sun Hee is studying Sociology in Kansai University in Japan. The Daily NK met these siblings at Kansai University and listened as they told of the vicissitudes of their lives.
It took four years for the siblings to enter South Korea after enduring a very uncertain existence in China, never quite knowing when they were going to be captured by the Chinese police and repatriated to North Korea.
Fortunately, the brother and sister, through the introduction of an acquaintance, grew up receiving love, which they had not been able to receive from their real parents, from Chinese foster parents. The siblings could attend school due to the compassion of their foster parents, but they could not live in full freedom due to the fear of being disclosed as North Koreans.
They wanted to go to South Korea. They received the help of Rescue the North Korean People! Urgent Action Network (RENK), and entered the South in 2000. At the time of their entry, their book “Loosing Hope Is Scarier Than Starvation: the diary of Anne Frank in North Korean version (The Zeitgeist),” which portrayed their plight during their defection process, was also published.
Just six months after entering South Korea, they passed all of their qualification exams for middle and high schools. Afterwards, Sun Hee, the sister, entered the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies and Choon Shik, the brother, attended a vocational college and tried to acclimate to South Korean society. However, without parents nor relatives, their lives were not smooth.
[imText2]Choon Shik graduated from the vocational college and entered a trade company and worked there for about a year, using his good Chinese ability. However, as a defector without experience in South Korean society, the work life proved to be a challenge and he could not help but to soon leave his job.
The siblings expressed, “If we had tried a little harder, we could have accomplished more, but the prejudice against defectors always trailed after me.” In 2005, five years after their life in South Korea, they decided to go to Japan to study upon the recommendation of Japanese NGO acquaintances who initially helped them enter South Korea.
When the siblings first mentioned going to Japan, people around them tried to dissuade them, saying, “Studying abroad is difficult for even average university students, so do you have the confidence that you, without parents or relatives, can do well?” However, the siblings decided to go to Japan with the same resolve that they had when crossing the Tumen River.
“A difficult life in Japan…But try to endure with the same resolve they had when crossing the Tumen River.”
Three months after arriving at Japan, they started working part-time jobs. They only knew basic Japanese, but had no other choice due to having to support themselves. After getting out of Japanese language academies, they would work late into the night. Sun Hee, who just turned 20, washed dishes in a kitchen over six hours a day.
“When I first started washing dishes, they were slippery, so I kept breaking them. Each time I broke a dish, I had to compensate my employer 1000 yen, so I would just wash the dishes with bare hands. After working for a month like that, my hands were so cracked. What I hated the most was the smell of decayed food. However, I wanted to experience in Japan all that there was to experience because I defected in search of freedom. It was difficult, but the hope that I would be able to gain new experiences kept me going.”
Choon Shik did all kinds of work during the early stages of his study in Japan. He worked at restaurants, supermarkets, bars, and convenience stores. Because he could not speak Japanese, he received smaller salaries compared to others, but still worked harder than anyone else. There were times, however, when he did not get paid for months at a time. He divulged, however, that more than anything else, the most difficult moments were when he would get looked down on for not being able to speak the language fluently.
“I started working right away after about three months in Japan. I first worked in a restaurant as an assistant of a chef, but the fact that I could not communicate my thoughts was most difficult. When the manager could not understand me, he would even hit me. When he started acting that way, the other workers started looking down on me, too. Being looked down on was harder than being beaten.”
Sun Hee met her boyfriend at her part-time job last year. She said that she thought about her mom a lot while seeing her boyfriend.
[imText3]”When my boyfriend found out about my identity as a defector, he said he wanted some distance from me. He said, ‘North Korea is a scary place and I do not have such positive impressions of the country.’ I was really hurt at the time. In particular, when my boyfriend told me that he did not want to introduce me to his parents because of the fact that I am an orphan and came from North Korea, I did not say anything, but thought a lot about my mom.”
Sun Hee, after her story was aired on NHK, was fired from her part-time job. When North Korea fired a missile in 2006, she was also kicked out of a cab due to the fact she was a defector. Choon Shik said that after the NHK broadcast, the attitude of Japanese friends from the same school department turned towards him. Some of the students would even whisper about him at the back of the lecture halls.
“I will not despair because I am a defector…I will show that I can do better than anyone else.”
Like in South Korea, the preconception in Japanese society regarding defectors made the siblings’ lives even more difficult. However, they refused to despair. Choon Shik, with the passing of time, began to gain confidence in his life in Japan.
“When I think about our suffering in North Korea and China, our experience in Japan is not a big deal in comparison. Of course at first, things were difficult, but everyone goes through difficult times. Now, I am quite satisfied with my life in Japan. I am no longer ashamed to be a defector. Rather, life in Japan has freed me from the shackles of being a defector. The mindset of Japanese people towards us is not so good, but with the improvement in my Japanese, I have gained confidence. I do not have any misgivings about being a defector anymore.”
They said that their life in South Korea was even more challenging. In South Korea, the label “defector” followed them around everywhere. When I saw the faces of South Korean people change upon being told that we are defectors, the siblings’ resolve that “defectors can do better than anybody else” apparently grew stronger.
The siblings who have a strong command of Chinese and Japanese also expressed their plan to study in the United Kingdom. The shadow of the past of death and fear, which had hitherto been cast over their faces, could nowhere be seen. Instead, they were full of the hope of youth in their 20s who are going for their dreams.
