Paul+Choi+KRW+Interview

=__**The Korean War Interview Project**__=

__The Interview__
__Part I__ media type="file" key="KRW Interview First part.mp3" __Part II__ media type="file" key="Paul Choi Asian Studies Grandmother Interview Podcast.mp3"

__The Release Form__
In view of the historical value of this oral history interview, I Seungmin Lee knowingly and voluntarily permit Paul Choi, Asian Studies, Korea International School the full use of this information for educational purposes.

Signature : Seungmin Lee 이 승민

Date : 2008. 12. 06

__Interview Questions__
What is your name, age, date of birth? 지금 성함, 연세, 그리고 생년월일을 말씀해주세요.

When the war started, what was your age? How was your life impacted? 전쟁이 발발하였을때 나이가 어떻게 되셨나요? 또, 그때 삶이 어떻게 뒤바뀌었나요?

What emotion do you feel when you go across the word “Korean War”? '6.25 전쟁'이란 단어를 들으시면 제일 먼저 어떤 느낌이 드세요?

Can you tell me any information you know about the Korean War? 그 당시에 배우셨거나 지금 6.25 전쟁에 대해서 아시는 정보를 조금 말씀해주세요.

Who do you think is to blame for the spark of the Korean War? 전쟁은 누구때문에 발발했다고 생각하시나요?

Can you describe how South Korea’s situation was right after the Korean War? 전쟁이 끝나고 나서 바로, 대한민국의 상황은 어땠나요?

What kind of hardships did you and your families go through? 할머니의 가족은 특별히 어떤 고난을 겪으셨나요?

What do you think makes the Korean War such a big scar in Korean history? 6.25 전쟁이 왜 한국사상에서 가장 큰 상처를 남겼다고 생각하세요?

How do you think of North Korea right now? 지금 북한에 대해서 어떻게 생각하세요?

Do you think the two Koreas can reunite or not? Why? 통일은 이루어질수 있을까요?

Right now the North and the South is still divided – why do you think it is hard to reunite? 전쟁이 휴전상태로 들어선지 어언 50년, 왜 아직도 통일을 하지 못한것일까요?

What do you think would be ‘good’ if reunification occurred? 통일을 하면 어떤점에서 좋을까요?

Do you have any other facts to tell that you think I should know? 지금 한국사를 배우고있는 학생들에게 마지막으로 하실 말씀 있으신가요?

__Summary Of Interview__
media type="file" key="KRW summary PODCAST.mp3"

__Analysis Questions__
Among many of the documents I encountered during class about the Korean War, the writing that appealed to me the most was the Still Life with Rice. The appeal mainly came from the fact that it was a first-person description on how the situation was like during the Korean War, and reflected emotions, which was able to add reality. The Still Life with Rice mainly describe how a family had to suffer because of the war – despite the fact that none of the family member did anything wrong – and how brutal people have turned. The readings described how food and water was scarce, and how people changed to only care about their own families’ security. During the interview with my grandmother – who was seventeen years old during the Korean War – I couldn’t believe how vivid her descriptions were, and how similar it was to the Still Life with Rice. In fact, I thought the author of the Still Life with Rice was my great-grandmother at one point. Quoting my grandmother during the interview, she said “although everyone was living their own lives, nothing was different; everyone looked like little toys living same lives every single day.” I could guess how the agony of war was evenly distributed without any exceptions. Also, the family hardships of my grandmother were almost identical to the one Hongyong had in the Still Life with Rice. Her property was violated, and her family members were forcefully taken away. Not only that, my grandmother related her experience with the ‘historic events’ that we see in textbooks such as ‘the fall of Seoul’, ‘the Incheon landing’ etc. As if she was the person writing all the passages in the textbooks, my grandmother’s descriptions couldn’t fit better with the reading materials I have read in class.
 * 1) How does your interviewee's testimony fit in with what you have learned about the experience of civilians?**

First of all, the War had caused equal amount of pain and inconvenience to everyone in Korea at the time. For example, the start of the War and the end of the War are events that were influential to every single individual. According to my grandmother, her family seemed to have struggled through two specific events during the Korean War; first, the fall of Seoul on June 1950, and the 1.4 retreat on April 1951. According to my grandmother’s descriptions, she didn’t find out about the Korean War before it was too late. While other neighbors evacuated south, her family stayed in Seoul until Seoul fell into the hands of the North Koreans. She emphasizes that the fall of Seoul – the hometown she spent all her life in – was by far the most influential event that occurred to her during the war. On top of everything, she said that she was pulled out of school, and spent most of the time in her house as if she was on house arrest. The only thing she could hear was gunshots and screams of the dying soldiers. My grandmother said it was a terrible experience, for she couldn’t eat, learn, or meet people she wanted to meet. She said, “It was like I was living in hell. The influence of the fall of Seoul was too terrifying that I didn’t feel like I was living.” The 1.4 retreat also had a major impact in my grandmother’s life at the time, but in a different way. This event actually helped her to avoid danger. As mentioned above, since her family failed to evacuate from the North Koreans, her families had to go through a lot of hardships. For instance, just like Hongyong’s husband, my grandmother’s husband also had to depart from home, and hide every night from the North Korean soldiers who were looking for him. However, when the military force of South Korea had to retreat from Seoul once again, my grandmother and her family managed to evacuate with them. Then, she moved to Jeju Island, where she could stay and live until the war ended. During the interview, and after I had listened to my grandmother tell the story, I was amazed and appalled at the fact that how a ‘historic event’ we see in textbooks caused such impacts in her life. In fact, if she did not manage to make the right decision at those ‘occurrences’, she could have been killed. Another thing I found very mournful was that whatever happened during the war, none of them ‘helped’ the civilians to carry on with their lives – in other words, no influence provided hope to people.
 * 2) Using your background knowledge try to contextualize their testimony. How do you think major events of the war affected their life at the time?**

Personally, I don’t think my grandmother and her family managed to stay out of danger at all. The fact that my grandmother’s father used to work for the South Korean government, and that the family was ‘South Korean’ were enough reasons for the North Koreans who occupied Seoul at the time to threaten their lives. According to my grandmother’s vivid descriptions, all the useful goods were taken away, and the soldiers confiscated even the smallest amount of food. The search for my grandmother’s father – most likely to kill – continued. With every little parts of their lives unfairly controlled by the North Koreans, my grandmother’s family was constantly exposed to danger and even death. However, if I were to point out how many of my grandmother’s family members managed to survive during the Korean War, the reason would be the evacuation during the 1.4 retreat. In fact, the only reason why my grandmother’s family was put under excessive danger was because they were oblivious about the War until the North Koreans took over and missed the chance of the first evacuation. My grandmother and her family evacuated to Jeju Island, and spent six years there – which was three years after the Korean War was over. Neither could my grandmother nor I say that the evacuation to Jeju Island actually made her family’s living condition better; however, it is true that her family was able to stay out of direct violence of the War.
 * 3) Hypothesize or explain how you interviewee was able to stay out of danger.**

__Essay__

 * Analyze the historical significance of your interview, how has the interview added to your understanding of the war, and how you think it will help us better understand the Korean War**

The reading materials and the primary sources that we review in class have great historical significances, for they provide clear information on what had exactly happened in the past which people cannot experience any more. Also, the abundance of these historical materials makes the contained information more fascinating and supportive. The interview that I had conducted with my grandmother, who had been through the Korean War herself, is not a passed down documentations with factual information. To be honest, the interview itself contains more emotion and personal experience than precise factual details. However, the interview possesses its historical significance because it can provide the learners with the emotions from a real person’s experience. The textbooks may be the best way for students to learn about what happened during a specific time period in history. What the textbooks cannot provide the students however, is the chance for them to feel the incident, and understand what kind of emotion it produced; after all, many of historical events became controversial or memorable because it aroused different people’s emotions. Therefore, the interview not only possesses a significant amount of historical value, but also opens up a way for students to understand the Korean War better. Before I interviewed my grandmother, all I was exposed to through middle school and high school were the primary documents and new articles back in the 1950’s, about how the two Koreas fought in the Korean peninsula for three years. Frankly, these professional information that was ‘fed’ to me didn’t mean much more than just materials that might come out in an exam. Of course, I was interested and even felt obliged to be informed of this specific historical event, since it was one of the biggest scars in my home country’s history. However, I couldn’t change the fact that I’m born in a generation so far away from the Korean War, that I lacked the comprehension of ‘how’ painful it is in the Korean history. When I started interviewing my grandmother, my thought began to change. My very first impression on how my grandmother answered my questions was ‘emotional.’ I like talking to my grandmother, and I definitely knew well that she doesn’t talk in a serious and emotional manner. Ever since I asked a question regarding the North Korean invasion that started the war, she exposed her grudge against the brutality North Koreans put on her family. There, I had the first realization that a same historical incident can appeal to me in such a different way. Unlike how I saw Korean War as a test material, I could literally image the agony the Korean civilians had to go through during the war. As a personal thought, I came to think that in order to understand history, one has to understand how the people who were involved in the historical incident were feeling about the incident. When the professionals can only analyze an incident, the people who were there could provide real image of an incident; this is what I think makes this interview different from the documents, and how it widens the view of the students in terms of education. Quoting my grandmother, she said, “Unless you go through the pain like me, you would never be able to guess how cruel and agonizing it is to be in a war.” Just like how the interview with my grandmother had inspired me and helped me to comprehend the Korean War better, I think her story would provide a unique point of view on the Korean War, thus helping other people understand the event. Before I conducted the interview, I’ve heard about many other stories of evacuation, war hardships. Unlike the stories I’ve heard before, my grandmother’s family was at a very special case – a dangerous one too – during the war. My grandmother’s family failed to evacuate the first time right before the North Koreans captured Seoul in 1950. This meant that her family was trapped in Seoul under North Koreans’ authority. Because of the fact that the family was a resident in Seoul, the North Koreans had exerted extra amount of cruelty and attention to my grandmother’s family, only worsening the pain of war. I think that the most valuable experience one can gain from listening to my interview is getting a vivid image of the agony during war with specific details my grandmother provides. This interview may lack in providing details on how the war went on, and how brutal the battlefield was like. However, my grandmother’s interview can surely help students who want to get more examples of how a civilian’s life was changed. This interview had not only provided me with rich details about the Korean War, but also brought me a realization on how I should view history. Unlike how I thought of history as records of events that occurred in the past, I now think of it as a rich source of passed down knowledge that can teach people lessons. Concerning Korean War, my grandmother and I sincerely hope that the two Koreas realize and think over the history carefully, so that no one has to suffer from the division of the peninsula anymore. “I’m deeply ashamed that the Koreas are too different from each other now; but one thing I’m sure is that Korea would develop best when people unite,” my grandmother said expressing both worries and hopes of reunification, “and I do hope that more students would learn, and grow up to solve the problems in history.”