YoungQ's+Interview


 * Interview With My Grandmother **

Interview with my grandmother: media type="file" key="Interview with grandma.mp3" width="240" height="20" Summary of the Interview: media type="file" key="Summary of the Interview.mp3" width="240" height="20"

**Basic Info:**

 * Name:** Young Sul Kwon
 * Date of Birth:** December 5, 1935
 * Job (right before the war):** student
 * Where: Near Daegu****, a more southern and rural place than Daegu.**

__Since my interview was in the form of a conversation, some of the question are just made by me based on the information that I got from the interview.__

몇살이셨어요? - I was 16 years old.
 * How old were you?**

어디계셨어요? - A countryside located very south of Korea called YoungCheon (영천), GaRyeShil (가례실).
 * Where were you?**

피난가셨어요? - No, other people came to our house to run away. I was in Daegu. Not even Daegu, more countryside than Daegu. So the refugees came and since we were farming, we cooked bori rice (보리밥) for the refugees and fed them. They slept in the yard because the yard was very big. Also, the North Korean soldiers who were hiding in the mountains always came down to the town at night and threatened the people for food.
 * Did you run away during the war?**

빨갱이들이 영천까지 내려왓엇나요? - Yes, they threatened us for food and shelter at night and said that they will kill us if we don’t give them food. So I cooked the rice for myself to give to the soldiers.
 * The reds came all the way down to your town in YoungCheon?**

남한군들이 할머니가 빨갱이들한테 밥준거때매 아무짓도 안햇어요? - Yes...but even though I cooked food for the North Korean soldiers, only the men got caught for helping them. So that’s why people came to your great uncle all the time for interrogation and all that other stuff. Your mom knows it.
 * Did the South Korean soldiers do anything to your family for giving North Korean soldiers food and shelter?**

사람들은 어떻게 대했나요? - The soldiers killed every man that they could see. The soldiers came to your great grandmother and asked where her husband was and they hit her leg. So your great grandmother damaged her leg because of that.
 * How were people treated?**

학교는 어떻게갓어요? - We couldn’t go to school. There was a war going on in the country, no one could go to school.
 * How did you go to school during the war?**

무서웠엇나요? - I was VERY, VERY scared. I hid in the mountains all day. One day the soldiers came to me and asked me where my father was. They shot the gun near me to scare me so that I tell them where my father was. It was a chaos.
 * Were you scared?**

누가 총에 맞아서 죽는거 목격하신적 있으세요? - No, but I knew from all the gun sounds and screaming people that people were getting killed. But I’ve never witnessed a person being killed in first person.
 * Have you ever witnessed someone being shot?**

할머니의 아버지는 아무데도 도망안가시고 영천에 계시고싶어하셨어요? - No, at that time, North Korea was known to be a better place to live. So my father, your great grandfather, tried to move to North Korea. But my mom disagreed with him and she hid us so that we did not move to North Korea. Thinking about it now, if we went to North Korea, we would now live in North Korea.
 * So your father (my great grandfather) never tried to go anywhere and just stayed in where he was?**

=**Reflection/Analyze:**=

This interview helped me better understand how cruel and horrifying war is in first person point of view. Usually, we only learn about the political, economical and the military view of a war, but through this interview, I could feel my grandma’s horror during that time and how scary of an experience it is for a civilian. During the Korean War, my grandma was only 16 years old. Usually girls should have freedom and hang out with her friends at this age. However, for my grandma, she spend her sweet sixteen in horror and fear every day. It was not how pretty she looked that she worried about every day. She worried about her safety and her family’s safety and whether they are going to be alive at the end of the day or not. My grandma lived in the southern part of Korea near Daegu, so she did not have to run away, but the Reds came to her house at night from the mountains and threatened them to give food. My grandma cooked bori rice (보리밥) and gave it to the soldiers. My grandma told me about how the soldiers used to wander around looking for men in the town and they would shoot and kill any man that they see. So the men would always hide during the day and come out during the night. When she was saying that, I could see the horror in her eyes. This vivid and detailed story of my grandma really touched me inside and taught me a different lesson that we don’t usually learn in a lecture or a book.