Written by Diem-Tran (Bijou) Nguyen
I received verbal consent from my NKD tutee to share this story. Her name was changed to protect her identity.
“What did you think?” I prompted Ji Min as she pulled the article, printed on heavily creased computer paper, out of her bag.
Ji Min adjusted her thin, wire-framed glasses, before meeting my eyes. “I,” she said, in her soft, understated voice, “I really like this article. It reminds me… much of my mother. She died from cancer.”
I was suddenly gripped by a fear that I had crossed a line. In our training for working with North Korean Defectors, we had been instructed to never ask our students about their families or life in North Korea, or bring up any sensitive issues that might trigger a negative or emotional reaction. Therefore, I was at a bit at a loss at what to do as Ji Min started to share her story.
Ji Min was my NKD student, whom I had met one-on-one during my first few months in Korea. Among her peers, Ji Min was by far the most advanced in English—I remember, upon our first meeting, she told me her goal was to be able to recite Steve Job’s commencement address at Stanford University by the end of our sessions.
In spite of her evident skill and mastery with the English language, Ji Min was rather cautious and timid when speaking, and I often had to prompt her with questions to create a dialogue. One night, we discussed Brittany Maynard’s story and whether or not “death with dignity” should be legal. While topics we had discussed in the past had sometimes seemed too abstract for Ji Min, she seemed very excited and passionate to discuss euthanasia. She believed euthanasia should be allowed, because the role of a doctor is to listen to the patient and to ease pain. I wondered how she knew so much about the Hippocratic Oath.
“I am very interested in this topic,” Ji Min continued, “because in North Korea I was a doctor.”
I was shocked to hear this.
As far as I knew at the time, Ji Min had grown up and lived in North Korea, until she finally escaped to South Korea with her two sons. How, I’ll probably never know. She had attended Chungnam University in Daejeon, and had a steady job that she enjoyed as an accountant. She worked full time to raise her two sons. Hardworking, soft-spoken, and diligent, she was dedicated to studying English, though she sometimes cancelled our appointments for business meetings or her sons’ open classes. But now, here she was, telling me about how she had worked as a physician in North Korea.
Ji Min continued to share that when she finally escaped to South Korea, her medical license was invalid.
“I had two babies to take care of and no job,” Ji Min said carefully, “and medicine in South Korea is very long. So I studied accounting instead so I would have a job more fast.”
“Are you happy as an accountant?” I cocked my head and looked at her, trying to get a read on her face, which usually was so solemn and stoic.
Ji Min paused and looked skywards for a moment. She normally seemed tired at our sessions—with a full day of work and a long commute on the Daejeon subway line, followed by a bus to get to Chungnam University—but right now, she looked especially exhausted. She sighed a little wistfully, and then continued.
“I think,” she said finally, “if I could be a doctor, I would in South Korea. I miss medicine and helping people with my hands, but this job I have right now—I really like it and it is good for my family. I saw a lot of suffering in North Korea, but now I am lucky to have a new life. So this article—thank you.”
Though there was nothing extreme or emotional about Ji Min’s reaction that day, I couldn’t stop thinking about her story as I boarded the train to head back to Jochiwon. I thought about Ji Min’s story, and how many pieces of her I will never know or understand—even if she chooses to share them with me.
I am not a stranger to hearing about hardship. My parents came to America as teenage refugees during the Vietnam War. They had nothing. The obstacles they had to overcome and the prejudice they faced are forever foreign to me. My mother was valedictorian of her high school class, but she was forbidden from making her speech at graduation because she could not afford an outfit nice enough to wear. My father lived squashed with his five siblings and two parents in a tiny room, as he worked three jobs in high school to help support his family. Because of the suffering they had witnessed and faced, they were inspired to pursue careers in medicine.
When I was three, my younger brother was diagnosed with leukemia. He spent two years in the hospital, but the cancer’s effects didn’t dissipate when he was in remission. Instead, his chemotherapy and radiation therapy drastically slowed his mental processes. As his older sister, I became his teacher and watched him work tirelessly to compensate. He is now a first year student in pharmacy school.
I think about Ji Min, who has gone through so much. I imagine seeing starvation firsthand, being desperate enough to leave all my family and friends, and risking being caught and tortured, all in hope of making a better life for myself in a country I have never even seen. I think about not having a second chance at the job I love. I think about how my parents and my brother succeeded in spite of all the odds stacked against them, and I am struck by the unfairness of Ji Min’s situation. Why couldn’t Ji Min do again, what she so badly wanted to do?
What if she has succeeded? What if her ultimate dream was to leave North Korea? What if to have one dream, she chose to give up another? I think about all of this, and I am so humbled by my blessings and how good life has been to me. I think about how this world needs more good, and how Ji Min, who loved helping others with all her heart, was robbed of this opportunity. I think about whether or not I can ever be as good of a doctor as she was.
I wonder if she’s as upset as I am.
I have often wondered if I am too emotional to be a doctor. When I decided to come to Korea, I thought I would be more prepared for medical school by the end of the grant year through learning to think on my feet in the classroom, adapting to a foreign culture, and becoming more independent. Though these lessons hold true, I am taking something more important back home. In Korea, I have found the patience and the willingness to listen to the stories of others. I have lived in a place where the language is foreign, but where I have witnessed the universal nature of pain and strength—of the human spirit and the resolve of the human heart.
Pain is a universal language, but simultaneously one that is unique to every person. Pain can’t be quantified, and it is subjective in nature. From the gutting ache of menstrual cramps to the acute heat of a migraine, everybody experiences pain differently, yet we are all connected by it. I want—no, I need—to do everything in my power to stop this pain in others. I will do the work that Ji Min wishes she could do, but cannot anymore.
In college, my biology professors used the term “homeostasis” liberally. Homeostasis is a phenomenon in which the human body tirelessly works to regulate and stabilize its internal conditions in conjunction with external environmental changes. Our bodies take external stimuli and make sense of them, sending us warnings and triggering defense mechanisms as feelings—including pain—all in an attempt to maintain the body’s homeostasis. I wonder, if perhaps, the mind works in the same way.
I think about chapters ending, and new chapters—stories, really—beginning. I think about Ji Min having no choice but to have a fresh start. Ji Min has started over: she is an accountant and a mother and a pioneer in South Korea—and her life in North Korea might sometimes just feel like a nightmare. She seems to have found peace.
I hope I can do the same.
Diem-Tran (Bijou) Nguyen is a 2014-2015 ETA at Janggi Elementary School and Uirang Elementary School in Sejong City.