In the Absence of Sun A Korean American Woman's Promise to Reunite Three Lost Generations of Her Family

April 18,1997 We were on our way! Three generations of usmy father, Halmoni, and Iwere going to China to redeem the past. Soon we'd be in Yanji, a city in China's Jilian Province. Siberia was to the north, Chinese Inner Mongolia to the west, and North Korea just to the south. Westerners rarely ventured to this remote northeastern region. It was way off the beaten track. We had to change planes twice, and at last we embarked on our third and final leg of the journey. It was unbelievable. After forty-seven years of separation, Halmoni was on her way to reunite with her son, Yong Woon. Ever since we had discovered that he was still alive in North Korea, I had not thought that a reunion would be possible. No one did. North Korea had been one of the most impenetrable and hostile nations in the world since the collapse of the Soviet Union and since the reforms in Cuba and China. Hardly anyone went in, and rarely did they go out. We prayed for a miracle. A month before our journey began, a Korean Chinese man named Choi Soon Man phoned my parents from China, collect. He had lifted the phone number off one of our letterheads, which Yong Woon Uncle had shown him. He offered to smuggle Yong Woon Uncle across the North KoreaChina border and bring him to his home in Yanji to visit with Halmoni, then sneak him back before the authorities discovered he was missing. Apparently, this man had befriended Yong Woon Uncle several years previously during one of his business trips to North Korea. He knew intimate facts about Halmoni that only Yong Woon Uncle could have revealed to him. My family was stunned, and for days we pondered his outrageous offer. Then we unanimously decided it was now or never. Halmoni couldn't wait any longer. Time was running out. Halmoni was a month shy of turning eighty-five (in Korean years she would be eighty-six, because a child was considered to be one at birth). Twice she had been hospitalized. Twice we had almost lost her. It was sheer force of will and her overwhelming desire to embrace her son one final time that made her rise from the hospital bed. And it was this same willpower and desire that was sustaining her during the long and exhausting journey from Los Angeles to Seoul to Beijing and finally to Yanji.Lee, Helie is the author of 'In the Absence of Sun A Korean American Woman's Promise to Reunite Three Lost Generations of Her Family' with ISBN 9780609609347 and ISBN 0609609343.