Jia: A Novel of North Korea (19 page)

One of the soldiers took the tools from the boy soldier's
hands, and 30 minutes later the engine of the car made a
tumultuous sound. Only half the passengers had returned,
and the soldiers didn't wait for the rest. The snub-nosed
woman didn't return, so, for five won, I shared another
woman's plastic bag.

n arrival at Kowon Station early the next morning,
I saw many kinds of people, and more kkot ebi than
you'd find in the Pyongyang station and street market. They
wandered around, begging for food from the crowds of
people waiting for the train. Cigarette smoke and offensive smells greeted me everywhere. People with large bags
grouped together-it made it easier to keep an eye on their
belongings.

The railroad police patrolled the station wearing darkgreen uniforms and expressionless faces, picking through
people's bags with their fingers or with their thick, shiny
truncheons. They looked about my age or a little older.
Shifty-eyed men hung about like smoke in the air, stealing
glances at people's bags. Young girls with worn-out clothes
but thick makeup were everywhere, shouting, "Flower! Buy a flower!" But none held flowers. They only approached
well-dressed, young and middle-aged men. Everything was
unfamiliar, and everyone looked suspicious to me.

I wandered through the station but couldn't find a place
to sit down. I suddenly felt someone was watching me carefully, following my movements, and I turned my head to find
a small boy, dressed in tatters. Like other kkot ebi, his face was
covered with dust. Under his hat, his eyes were twinkling,
and as soon as they met mine, he walked directly to me, with
a slight limp. That was my first encounter with Sangwon.

When he was close enough, he smiled and asked, "Do
you have some food to share with me?"

I looked down at him skeptically, and he didn't take his
eyes off me. Of course, I didn't have food to share. Everyone knew no one had food to share; the only way hungry
people could survive was to steal, so this boy was either
really bold or not so smart.

Setting out on my journey, I had made a firm resolution
that I wouldn't share food; my own survival came first. I
had just one loaf of bread and an ear of corn, and I needed
to save what little money I had left. But Sangwon's blunt
eyes, so steady on mine, made me hesitate. Or perhaps it
was his limping leg that changed my mind.

I said, "I just have one piece of bread and one ear of
corn."

I would have felt better if he had pretended to cry or grab
my leg, but he just pouted with his lower lip, shrugged his
shoulders, and said, "Okay. If you think that isn't enough
for two people, that's fine. Have a good trip."

He was funny. His way of watching me and withdrawing without a fuss compounded my guilt.

As he turned around to walk away, I called after him. "Wait... Maybe.. .we can make do with these for breakfast."

Sangwon turned back and smiled. "And then I might
help you if it's your first time traveling," he said, winking.
"I know where we can have a peaceful meal."

Like a gentleman escorting me, Sangwon gestured in
the direction we should walk, strutting triumphantly, as
though he had won something. His wiry body moved nimbly through the crowd.

He took me outside the station to an out-of-the-way
corner that was chilly but still the perfect place for two
people to sit side by side. Not too stinky either. He took his
jacket off and shook it briefly. Laying it on the ground, he
grinned, motioning for me to sit down. I felt the ground
would be cleaner than his jacket, but I didn't rebuff the offer. Sangwon sat down next to me on the bare ground.

He smacked his lips as I took the food out of my bag, so
I broke the bread in two and gave him the bigger half.

"I haven't seen bread for a long time. I eat watery gruel
every day. That place only makes begging on the street
look good." He stuffed himself with bread.

"Which place?" I asked.

"The nine-twenty-seven. I just got out of the ninetwenty-seven. Have you heard of it?" His big, round eyes
turned to me; his cheeks bulged.

I had heard of the 927. The government tried to move
beggars and people unable to make a living on their own to
a specific place in each province, forcing them into abandoned buildings, usually former hotels. Because this system
was instituted on September 27, 1997, it was called the 927.
Supposedly it kept people from dying of hunger.

"Why didn't you stay there? At least you'd be fed regularly."

Sangwon's eyes bugged. "Are you kidding? Have you ever
slept sitting up for several nights? That place doesn't protect
people, it creates more problems. People die in there from
diseases and hunger-we don't need that kind of protection."
He ripped a piece of hard bread off with his teeth and ate it;
he reminded me of a lion gnawing the meat off a bone.

"Why would you sleep sitting up?"

Sangwon stopped chewing and opened his mouth halfway. "You don't know anything. You're an alien, no wonder you stuck out."

He finished his bite and swallowed. "They put too many
people in one small room. We all ate better on the outside."

When he spoke, he had to look up at me, and because
his big hat covered his eyes, he took it off. His head was
clean except for several scabs forming over his sores. He had
no eyebrows or eyelashes; there was not one strand of hair
on his face. He looked as if he had escaped from a Buddhist
temple, not the 927.

"How long were you in there?" I asked, interrupting his
eating again.

"Who knows? I gave up counting after seventeen days.
Sitting in a corner, counting the days, made me more desperate. Anyway, I need to leave here as soon as possible. I
don't want to end up back there."

"How did you run away?" I asked.

This time, he didn't raise his head to speak. "Through the
window. I was stuck on the sixth floor. Some of the kids made
a rope with our clothes and we ran away together. When the
girl right after me was climbing down, the rope snapped. She
fell and was dead on the spot. It could have been me."

I was shocked that such a small boy could talk about
death with such a poker face.

Sangwon raised his head and his eyes fixed on my piece
of bread. I hadn't started eating yet, so I handed it to him.

He shook his head. "I'm not going to eat my fill. I don't
want to make my stomach expand." He patted his gut and
smiled. "This guy is so sneaky. I give him enough food, but
he always wants more. He's never completely satisfied, so I
have to control him, or he'll control me. That's your share.
I really appreciate what you gave me, but that's enough for
today." He looked at me candidly, his eyes twinkling. Who
could resist this face?

Sangwon pushed my hand back and urged me to eat the
bread. I noticed that there were two stumps on his left hand
where his fourth and fifth fingers should have been.

He saw me staring at his hand and raised both hands to
show me. "I was lucky. That time, I was using my left hand
and not my right."

He had tried to steal some food from a market stall while
the owner wasn't paying attention, but just as Sangwon's
hand approached the food, the owner caught sight of him
and grabbed his knife. He just wanted to scare him, but
Sangwon's two fingers were lopped off in an instant. The
owner was as surprised as Sangwon, and they wept loudly
together. Sangwon got the food from the owner, but his
fingers were lost.

Sangwon told this as if it was someone else's story. He
must have been used to it-he spoke so well. He looked
about six or seven years old, but I guessed he was 11 or 12.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

I put a piece of bread in my mouth and chewed for a
while. Could I trust this boy? Could I tell him I was running away? "I'm trying to get out of here," I said, almost
to myself.

He watched me and kept his mouth shut for a while. At
length, he said, "I got this disease when I was in the mountains."

Sangwon lifted one foot and removed his sock. All the
toes were black from frostbite. He picked up a stone from
the street, and before I could stop him, pounded the top of
his foot with it. When I took the stone away from him, he
smiled and said, "It's okay. I don't feel anything. They're
completely dead. They aren't part of my body anymore."
He put his sock back on.

"You should go see a doctor," I said, still staring at his
foot.

"Oh, well. It's been long time. I got it when I crossed
the river. Not a big deal."

Sangwon had guessed my plan. Most people came here
hoping to cross the border; their large bags gave them away.
Wandering around with a small backpack certainly made
me look like a novice.

"I ran into pickpockets in a street market," I explained.
"I didn't expect it. An old woman let me know my backpack was torn; I even didn't realize I had been robbed."

"Don't trust anybody here-even old women or soldiers. Oh, soldiers are the worst! They can do whatever
they want. Don't even think about sitting next to them.
Actually, you shouldn't have trusted me either."

He smiled as he said this, and I smiled back at him. How
could I not trust this boy?

"This time of year is okay. In winter, it's easy to cross
over because the river is frozen, but border control is much
stricter. Summer is tougher-the water isn't as cold as in
winter, but the river is high and the current is really fast, so
border control isn't as strict. Young guys try in the summer. Spring is the best time, because the water is low and not too
cold. Now is still a little bit early. The ice must have melted,
but the water will still be chilly. You should be prepared."

Sangwon put his hat back on. The hat was big and was
peppered with cigarette burn-holes, but it looked really
warm. I helped him find the front of the hat, and he pressed
it down hard and said, "If you'll trust me one more time,
we can go together."

I raised my eyebrows.

"We should get out of here as soon as possible," he continued. "I was heading to the border too."

I nodded, and he reached out his hand, smiling, and motioned me to do the same. He slapped my palm twice. "Okay.
So we're comrades from now on. Did you buy a ticket?"

"Not yet. I don't know if I have enough money."

"How much do you have?"

I showed my money to Sangwon, my comrade. He counted it and said, "It looks okay, if the station didn't raise the
fares." He stared pointedly at the badge on my chest. "But
there is one way to make money." He handed my money
back to me and asked, "Do you have a travel permit?"

"Here." I showed it to him, but he barely looked at it.

"Okay. Then it's much easier. What's your destination?"

"I haven't decided yet. I can go as far as Onsong with
this card."

"Then let's go to Hoeryong. That's closer to the place
where I usually stay in China."

We rose and walked behind the station. I saw a line of
eight or nine people sitting down with their backs against
the wall. Some leaned their heads on the person next to
them, their eyes closed tight, while others gazed blankly in
front of them, never blinking. Their skin was black, but it was different from the foreigners with black skin I'd seen at
the hotel. Black spots covered their faces.

"Sangwon, don't you think those people look weird?" I
poked his forearm.

Sangwon pulled me to his side. "You'd better not look.
They're dead."

"No!" I shouted, in spite of myself, gripping his hand
tightly.

"They all died of starvation, waiting there."

I looked again. The dead sat naturally and seemed to
watch people as they passed. I shuddered with fear.

Inside the station, Sangwon elbowed his way through the
crowd and pulled me along. We came to a man wearing a
neat blue coat, standing with a small bag at his feet. The
man lit a cigarette.

Sangwon walked up to him and pulled at his coat lightly.
"Hello, sir. Did you find good things to buy over there?"

He looked down at Sangwon with annoyance and
snapped, "Go away. I don't have any food."

"No, sir. That's not my business with you today. I have a
badge to sell-how about a hundred and fifty won?"

The man sneered, "Where? Show it first. If you're lying,
I'm going to break both your legs."

"See, I'm not lying." Sangwon pointed at my chest. The
man's eyes moved to the badge and then up to my face, then
to Sangwon and back to me.

"Are you willing to sell it?" he asked.

Sangwon glanced at me quickly and whispered, "You
won't need that over there." Then he grinned and replied,
"She will, for a hundred and fifty won. It's a nice one, with
two leaders' faces on one badge. You can sell it at a good price to foreign travelers if they know it's really from North
Korea."

The badge showed the faces of both Kim 11 Sung and
Kim Jong 11. Working at the hotel, I had had to wear it at
all times. I couldn't believe I was selling it now. My chest
without the badge-I hadn't even considered that possible.