교육학박사 김한중교수의 Attribution

Forlorn death

Forlorn death

In that summer, anthracnose that makes chili peppers sick and black, was in its full swing.

Thus, people were fighting against the pepper plague that was making people unable to harvest any pepper, by using all kind of pesticides.

My house wasn’t an exception.

My mom went out even at dawn, got some chili pepper from the field, and sprayed a powerful vaccine anthracnose.

She ended her work very late, and when she went into the kitchen, she almost freaked out.         

Some kind of beast-like person with a black, shabby cloth opened the top of the pot that was on the top of the microwave, and was eating something like a pig.

“Who are you?”    

“......”    

“I said, who are you?”    

“Chill-on......”    

“What? Are you Chill-on? Look at me. What are you doing here?”  

  

“Meal...... Meal...... I had my meal.”    

“What’s wrong with your cloth? Where are you coming from and why are you eating here?”    

Without answering what my mother asked him, Chill-on stuffed rice in his mouth without a pause.

When he was quite full, he spoke out.    

“Auntie, I’m sorry. I just came in because it was your house.”

   

“I would have given you a meal if you asked for it. Where are you coming from? The rehabilitation facility?”   

 

“Shit, I ain’t going there. I would rather die that go back to that place again.”  

  

“Why? The foreman said it’s quite a good place. Why are you telling me that you are not going back?”    

“It hurts too much. I ain’t going. I will never go back.”    

“It hurts? What do you mean?”    

“They hit so badly. Shit, I ain’t going there.”

Indeed, all over his arm, I could see bold bruises that looked like it was made lately and dim bruises that looked like it was made long time ago but got better.

Sometimes, they broadcasted the poor environment and treatment of rehabilitation facility and became the focus of the public attention.

Chill-on was one of the people who received such poor treatment.

Now I understand why he didn’t want to go there.    

“Alright. If you don’t want to go, you don’t have to go. Your house is in the same place as the past, so you can just live there. Help the town work when time allows you to and just live here.”    

Like a generous mother, my mother felt mercy on poor Chill-on and was glad that Chill-on showed up.

But the peace didn’t last for long.    

“Where did this son of a bitch go. I am going to break this paltry fellow’s leg.”  

  

“What’s the matter?”    

“Here you are. How dare you make me a fool? I told everyone that you are living where there, and you spitted in my face.”    

“Shit I ain’t going there. I would starve to death. They hit me every single day. I said I ain’t going.”    

“Hey you bastard, you are telling me that you are not going even after I pay so much money to cure you?”    

After hearing foreman’s fierce and brutal voice, people began to gather up one by one; half with curiosity and half with fear.    

“Why are you trying to send him? He said he doesn’t want to go.”    

“Shit, if you don’t know, just stay quiet. Or else, you can take him and breed him.”    

Being unable to remain mere spectators, elders tried to speak up to take Chill-on’s side.

However, people already knew by experience that voices didn’t have any power.  

  

After a while, village foreman grabbed Chill-on’s hand, telling him to go with him.

However, unlike other times, Chill-on resisted strongly and refused to accompany.   

 

“Don’t be obstinate. Why are you behaving so indecently? Others can be not, but you should be thankful to me. You should better move yourself.”    

“I said I ain’t going. I will just live here, in my house.”    

“Where the hell is your house moron. We pulled down long time ago. Move yourself.”

At that time, nobody knew when he saw that, but Chill-on grabbed sharp sickle that was in the ware house along with other tools, and confronted village foreman.    

“Now this son of a bitch is trying to bite the hands that fed him. Bring it on. I’m going to kill you first.”    

After he said that, he came back with a hunting gun in his hand.

Village foreman’s father was a hunter who caught animals down in the mountain.

That’s the reason why his father was called as ‘gunman,’ or ‘Mr. Gunman.’

Now, village foreman brought the hunting gun that might be the keepsake of his father.

Chill-on hesitated and stepped back, but village foreman struck Chill-on’s shoulder as hard as he could.

Chill-on fell down and village foreman thrash him within an inch of his life.

If town people didn’t stop him, Chill-on probably would have faced death like a dried pollack.

Soon after, the ambulance came, took Chill-on and people who were afraid of village foreman’s threat scattered like the ants. 

“You’ve got a problem? Is there something wrong here?”    

“What an ignorant bastard. We might get involved. Let’s just go.”  

  

After then, our house was refused to get benefits that township provided, just because we hid and fed Chill-on in our house.

The reason was simple.

It was because whether it was intended or not, we allowed Chill-on to stay in our house.

It was like venting his anger to hide his embarrassment from shady conduct.    

Quite a long time passed.

In the end, Chill-on faced the lonely death in the rehabilitation facility.   

          

Not just from village foreman’s beating, but the swamp of loneliness, hunger and disease, that was created by their even harsher inhumane treatment, swallowed Chill-on.

Since there were nobody that would take care of his cemetery, the case was finished with cremation.

The passbook of poor Chill-on that was not that different from unearned income, was clawed back by government after Chill-on’s death, village foreman flung himself about in anger, as if they took his private property.

However, his groundless fear was just an pure insistence that didn’t make any sense.

Few days later, some plastic bag with useless junks in it, arrived from rehabilitation facility, telling that it was the keepsakes of Chill-on.

Neighbor Mrs. Choi didn’t say anything after she received the bag from rehabilitation facility worker.

Some aunties dropped the tears and blew their noses with a honk.   

 

“Jesus, what a pitiful guy he is.”    

“Look at this. He still had the dolls that we swore at and told him to throw away.”    

A picture that came out from shabby junks made us to drop our tears once again.

Once, Chill-on’s mother came to our house to work, and she was staring enviously at our family picture that my father took for us.

We decided to buy a new camera to take family pictures, and we were having chattering about it with curiosity.    

“Oh, it’s so beautiful. Sunwha will look great if she takes a picture too......”    

Sunwha was the oldest daughter of Chill-on’s brother Yonghee, who just turned a first year.     

After my father saw envy and sorrow in eyes of Yonghee’s mother, he went to her house in that evening.    

After he made the whole family to gather up, he took a picture for them.

They gathered up in a hurry, but they already changed their clothes, washed their hairs, and Yonghee sat on the edge of the floor.

Yonghee’s parent sat in the center with Sunwha on her mother’s laps, and other family members gathered up around them.

The picture of awkward and shy family picture was the first and the last keepsake that was left over.

The fact that Chill-on had that family picture was  surprising and was the last meaningful thing that Chill-on had in this world.

He was born like an insect, worked like a dog, and his funeral, that should be condolence fully, didn’t even take place and he just passed away like an ill wayfarer.

Last moment of his life clearly showed how miserable and empty people’s lives are.

A man who was born as a son of extremely poor farmer, didn’t even have a single field to farm, but loved all the lives and treated them sincerely, as if they were part of him, left this world without anything in his hand, just like how he came to this world.

If he gets a chance to reborn again in this world, I hope him to born as a normal person; not as poor as his previous life, nor as fool as to get bullied by people.    

Characters

Chill-on : person who didn’t even went to elementary school, but picked up farming and lived as a farmer, as if he was born to be it. He has huge attachment to the cultivator, and as a result, have some trouble with the son of the owner that Chill-on was working for. As he got older, symptoms of schizophrenia was found from Chill-on, lived in the poor shelter, went to rehabilitation facility forcibly by the village foreman, and passed away in rehabilitation center because of beating up he got from village foreman.  

Village foreman: man who left the town with circus troupe when he was a middle school student, but came back to town after making his own family, after 30 years later. Earn money by selling the crops everyday that he harvested in his farm and swine raising. He managed and illegally used Chill-on’s passbook, after he got elected to village foreman. He forced Chill-on to go into the rehabilitation facility, making Chill-on to face the death in the end.

Mrs. Choi: One who spreads all the rumors that come out from the down. She was a far relative of Chill-on, but didn’t care about him, until she showed cunning behavior of secretly taking the subsidy that came out from government to Chill-on.

Yong: elder brother of Chill-on who was incompetent and drunkard who drank alcohol every single day. He thought his wife cheated on him when she went out for work, use violence, and made his wife to commit suicide by taking pesticide in the end. After then, he began to hear auditory hallucination and committed suicide as well.

Mr. Go: Person who has the largest land in the town, and uses those lands to lend to people and get pay for it. For Chill-on, who didn’t even have an ability to pay back, Mr. Go made him work every single minute and didn’t like Chill-on to work in other houses. He fully uses Chill-on’s ability to work as a cow.