In Memoriam Luck-Hyun Sung, a Korean Patriot

Dear Luck-Hyun Sung,

       My heart breaks to hear you have left us. I’ll be following you soon, judging from the persistent geriatric signs like lightheadedness and heaviness in the legs, but in the meantime who shall I turn to, tell me, to unload and be unloaded to, refreshing and recharging our minds?

       I remember your coming to one of my talks at the Korea Society decades ago. It had to do with my stories regarding our divided fatherland, the freaky monster, Siamese Twins joined at the DMZ hip. At the end of the program as we broke up, in tears of anger and pain, because you are a passionate lover of your fatherland, however degraded or hopeless, you sternly ordered me: “Figure out the jointure and suture!”

       That was 4 decades ago, or maybe 5, and I haven’t done much to comply with your commandment. But lately I have made a feeble attempt, an appeal to Jongeun Kim (A Petition to Supreme Leader of North Korea Jongeun Kim, amazon.com) who has reportedly renounced unification as North Korea’s agenda, to retract and carry out unconditional unification by walking over to Seoul because he can do it, supreme as he is in North Korea to a degree no other head of state in the whole world can lay claim to, certainly not his counterpart in South Korea, and become Dangoon II.

       Please move him now that you are over there in the spiritual world. All of us Kyunggi alums still remaining here will cheer you and be grateful.

       Ty Pak