I headed toward Italy by way of Belgium and Germany. In the train, I accidently met a couple of Korean travelers and got some information sharing trip stories. I think the real charm of traveling is to feel fresh, having new experiences with new people in new places, getting out of monotonously repetitive daily life. As leaving behind Korea two weeks ago, I enjoyed myself traveling alone. I walked toward the Coloseum as soon as I arrived in Rome. As it was described in lots of movies, the largest of the Roman Amphitheaters exuded an atmosphere of greatness and majesty the Roman Empire once had.

When I was about to leave there after I did sightseeing, some people all dressed in the Roman Empire costume came up to me. They suddenly grabbed my camera and started taking a picture of me with some of them. I thought that they provided visitors with this splendid service sponsored by a city government. But, after taking some photos, they asked me to pay for it. Now I am familiar with the tipping culture for street performance since I moved to San Francisco, which is famous for busking, but at that time I did not understand why they expected me to pay. Unwillingly, I gave them 1000 lira, but they began getting mad at me. (A lira was the unit of money used in Italy, but now it has been replaced by the euro.) They had every right to be pissed off because it was about fifty cents worth in those days. I could not afford to pay more as a hungry backpacker. After the five-minute of haggling over the tip, I got out of there with my camera.

In 2001, I took a backpack trip to Europe during my first summer vacation in college. When I got home to Busan as a semester finished, my mother already bought round-trip ticket, departing for Heathrow airport in London. It was scheduled a week later, so having no time to be surprised by my mother’s action, I started to get myself ready to leave, reading Lonely Planet, the most famous travel guide. It was too busy to change won into traveler’s checks or other countries’ currency, because at that time, there was no Euro, a single European currency. Leaving my family and home, I took Korean Airlines with my heart aflutter in anticipation of the trip. Just the thought of being abroad and alone made me restless. I arrived at Heathrow airport in the evening. After getting the map at an information center, I walked around in London to find an accommodation, carrying a heavy knapsack. Wandering from place to place and asking passer-bys for directions, I found an old but cheap hotel. It was drizzling outside the window, and I was lonely and tired mentally and physically. My first impression about London was chilly and hard. It was rainy, as usual in London, and unlike most Americans, who seem friendly, people looked very ice-cold and strict.

Arirang

The next day, beginning with the Changing of the Guards at Buckingham Palace, I looked around many sightseeing attractions, such as Tower Bridge, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and Saint Paul’s Cathedral. Busking was impressive on the streets. To attract visitors’ attention, some played musical instruments, and others, dressed up with their makeup, performed mime. Now I see a lot of street performers in San Francisco, but it was hard to see those kinds of buskers in Korea in 2001. After 10 days of travel in England, I crossed the Straits of Dover via the Euro Line, and reached Brussels in Belgium. At that time, there was a parade to celebrate Veterans’ day, and I saw a group with a Korean national flag. Gladly looking at them, I took some pictures of them, and some people in the group spoke to me and asked if I was Korean. Then, they told me that they participated in the Korean War in 1950s and started singing “Arirang,” which is a Korean traditional elegy. In fact, the song expresses “Han,” the unique emotion of Koreans, which is similar with the feeling of sorrow or lamentation but cannot be exactly explained or translated in English. While singing the song, they held my hands firmly and were completely moved to tears. It seemed that they understood the feeling only Koreans have in the song’s lyrics. I was really grateful of their courage and sacrifices fighting for my country and bowed down in deference to them.

This world is full of stories and I have always enjoyed telling mine. I started writing so that I could grab  and memorize the moments. I liked to express emotion through my five senses with candid, pure words. I wrote over and over again till I could produce appropriate words from my heart, which were able to directly help people have the same feeling I experienced.  Fortunately, I won lots of prizes in writing contests. Once I received the prizes from my high school principal in front of all the students in my school, I felt like I was in heaven. I realized doing what I like and getting recognized for my work brought me a lot of happiness.

I believe that I got a gift and interest in writing from my parents. My father majored in Journalism, and my mother studied Korean literature in colleges. They first met each other at “Writing Friends,” a city-wide meeting for high school’s writing club in Busan, my hometown. Sometimes, my father won the first prize, and my mother won second place in national writing contests. They still have strong affection for literature.

My mother was fairly fond of reading my diaries. She might have wondered what her son did during the day or what kind of thoughts he had. Eventually, she assembled my diaries and made a book which we called “Toosiri’s diary.” Toosiri means chubby in Korean. When I was young, I had fat on my cheeks, and my mother called me by that name. Looking at my mother smiling while she read my diaries, I desired to write better and better. I tried record my feelings for longer and in more detail. Thanks to my parents, my diary that I started writing due to my school assignment helped me become passionate about my writing.