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GUEST LITERATURE – KOREA was being built. Chang-dae had the sense that one of the higher-ups was using the military for his own private purpose. Since the weather was getting colder, the tight construction schedule forced them to work till midnight, under the headlights of the military trucks. He didn’t like the feeling of their gaze on him each time he went in and out of the house.The area around the house was so full of construction; it reminded Chang-dae of his childhood in Seoul during the 1970s. He took his tourist map of Ulaanbaatar and went sightseeing around the city. It was only a forty-minute walk to get to the staterun department store in the city centre. The city was so small that you could travel anywhere on foot.The only thing inconvenient was that you had to risk your life every time you used a crossing.The cars pushed right into the crossings, with complete disregard for the pedestrians. It didn’t matter if there were street lights. On several occasions, Chang-dae began crossing the street at the ‘Walk’ signal, only to have to turn back in the middle of the crossing. Most of the cars were second-hand, imported from all around the world. Some of them had the driver’s seat on the left, some on the right. There was an almost acrobatic grace to the way all these cars wove in and out of traffic. A fierce sandstorm blanketed the city from time to time. Gusts of wind carrying sand would hit you like a swarm of locusts then slip away, disappearing between the buildings. Chang-dae’s eyes were still kept open in wonder as he scouted the city little by little.There was the Gandan Lamasery, which was a prominent work of architecture in the heart of the city. A gallery of paintings that depicted the Mongolian plains in rich, variegated shades. Palaces of kings. Department stores overflowing with handcrafted goods made of leather or wool. He felt he’d endured the cold wind and absorbed the whole of Mongolian civilization in three days. He had felt unsure and lost about his life here, but now he felt more confident. He resolved to learn how ordinary Mongolians went about their lives day-to-day. He spread open the map, searching for the biggest market in the city.There it was: the Narangtol Market. It was located on the right edge of the map. He’d once read on the internet that markets like these sold Russian-made binoculars at a cheap price. Russia was far from well off now, but once it had sent rockets to the moon. 184 BANIPAL 43 – CELEBRATING DENYS JOHNSON-DAVIES
page 187
JEON SEONG-TAE Before leaving the house he took out his passport and left it in the drawer. It could be risky to carry it around a marketplace teeming with people. He made sure to put the keys in his trouser pocket. Checking to be sure he had the key on him at all times had become a harrowing obsession. Even after walking outside the door with the key, he checked his pockets again before he closed the door behind him. He’d become a slave to keys. On more than one occasion, when he was in his twenties, he’d had to call the locksmith after losing them. The service had cost him dearly. When he got married and started his newly married life in his old apartment, it was a great relief for him to know that he no longer had to worry about losing his keys. He joked to his single friends, telling them they should just get married if they ever wanted to be freed of the tyranny of keys. Shortly before their child was born, his wife went to stay with her parents for the delivery, and he’d stayed out late drinking with his friends for the first time in a while. After arriving home, he realized that he had managed to lose his keys. It was in the early morning hours and torrential rain was pouring down. It was a nuisance but nothing to get worked up about. All around the building there were stickers advertising locksmiths. They were on call, ready to be dispatched at a moment’s notice. He called three or four places but either got no answer or when he did they refused to come out. Finally a locksmith agreed to come out, but the man asked for sixty thousand won for the trouble, citing the foul weather and the early hour. He couldn’t wait till the morning in this typhoon, so he bit the bullet and agreed to pay the man what he asked. He couldn’t tell his wife about it. After this incident he started wearing a keychain clipped to the waist of his trousers like a pair of tiny handcuffs. Five years later, he was finally freed from his keys after moving to an apartment with a locking mechanism that opened with a password. He stopped in the middle of putting his wallet in his pocket and took out the amount he would need for the binoculars. He put the wallet containing his two credit cards in the drawer. He was about to take off his watch when he found himself shaking his head.Without knowing why, he became annoyed with the way he was behaving. The Narangtol Market deserved its reputation of being the biggest market of its kind. It was enormous in scale and teeming with shoppers. No matter which store you entered, it was hard to even stand in place without being pushed along by the waves of people every- BANIPAL 43 – SPRING 2012 185

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GUEST LITERATURE – KOREA

was being built. Chang-dae had the sense that one of the higher-ups was using the military for his own private purpose. Since the weather was getting colder, the tight construction schedule forced them to work till midnight, under the headlights of the military trucks. He didn’t like the feeling of their gaze on him each time he went in and out of the house.The area around the house was so full of construction; it reminded Chang-dae of his childhood in Seoul during the 1970s.

He took his tourist map of Ulaanbaatar and went sightseeing around the city. It was only a forty-minute walk to get to the staterun department store in the city centre. The city was so small that you could travel anywhere on foot.The only thing inconvenient was that you had to risk your life every time you used a crossing.The cars pushed right into the crossings, with complete disregard for the pedestrians. It didn’t matter if there were street lights. On several occasions, Chang-dae began crossing the street at the ‘Walk’ signal, only to have to turn back in the middle of the crossing. Most of the cars were second-hand, imported from all around the world. Some of them had the driver’s seat on the left, some on the right. There was an almost acrobatic grace to the way all these cars wove in and out of traffic.

A fierce sandstorm blanketed the city from time to time. Gusts of wind carrying sand would hit you like a swarm of locusts then slip away, disappearing between the buildings. Chang-dae’s eyes were still kept open in wonder as he scouted the city little by little.There was the Gandan Lamasery, which was a prominent work of architecture in the heart of the city. A gallery of paintings that depicted the Mongolian plains in rich, variegated shades. Palaces of kings. Department stores overflowing with handcrafted goods made of leather or wool. He felt he’d endured the cold wind and absorbed the whole of Mongolian civilization in three days. He had felt unsure and lost about his life here, but now he felt more confident.

He resolved to learn how ordinary Mongolians went about their lives day-to-day. He spread open the map, searching for the biggest market in the city.There it was: the Narangtol Market. It was located on the right edge of the map. He’d once read on the internet that markets like these sold Russian-made binoculars at a cheap price. Russia was far from well off now, but once it had sent rockets to the moon.

184 BANIPAL 43 – CELEBRATING DENYS JOHNSON-DAVIES

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