The Daily - A Family Divided by the Korean War

Episode Date: April 30, 2018

In a historic summit meeting, North and South Korea vowed to pursue a peace treaty to formally end the Korean War after more than 65 years. That could bring reunions for the thousands of families who have been separated since the war broke out. Guest: Sylvia Nam, whose grandfather went to North Korea just after the Korean War started and never returned. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily.

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today, in their historic summit, North and South Korea vowed to pursue a peace treaty that would end the 65-year-long Korean War. That could finally mean reconciliation for the thousands of families who have been separated from one another since the war broke out. It's Monday, April 30th.

My first recollections about my grandfather came from the stories from my grandmother as well as my mother. My grandfather is from South Korea. He was a professor and an engineer. And these stories really involved how his absence basically determined the fate of the family. Sylvia Nam's grandfather went to North Korea in 1950, just a few months after the Korean War started, and never came back. When my grandfather disappeared, my grandmother was 28 years old. My eldest aunt was four years old. My eldest aunt was four years old. My second aunt was three years old.

My mom was about one or two. And my uncle was a newborn. He was three weeks old. As a kid growing up, my mother would talk about what it meant for her to grow up without a father, both in terms of having a parent love her and also in a family growing up in Korea where you actually do need a male breadwinner, how it really impacted their lives. They lived in pretty utter destitution. It was a man that I think she was deeply bitter towards because I think that she knew

that her life would have been very different had he stayed behind. What did you know about why he disappeared? The thing that I had heard growing up as a kid were contradictory and included one story that involved him being kidnapped by

North Korean soldiers. The other story was that because it was the Cold War period and he was an academic and intellectual that he had socialist or communist sympathies and therefore went north and therefore potentially had abandoned his family in the name of ideology. And then the third was this kind of gray space, unknown, fill in the blank type of story that perhaps something had happened to him and that he couldn't come back to the family. Hmm. What did your mother think happened to him? family. What did your mother think happened to him? The more plausible explanation for his disappearance and one that I think my mother held on to was the fact that he defected in the name of ideology and then abandoned them. This is the one that I think helped her understand how things

panned out for her as well as her mother and her siblings. And it was also the most painful theory as well. So as the years went on and you enter adulthood, did you become more interested in finding out the real story behind what happened to your grandfather? Yeah, so my grandmother wanted to go to South Korea and nobody wanted to take her. So I volunteered to take her in the summer of 2001. And what I didn't realize is that she wanted to go back to the neighborhood that she and my grandfather and their children had lived in. And she wanted to go and re-meet all of her old neighbors and tell them that she had made it in America.

But in that trip, one of the most moving and sad meetings that we had was with one of my grandfather's former colleagues at the university. So when we went to go meet him, he pulled out a photo album. You know, these were photos of his children who had gone to college and were professionally very successful. And I was looking at these images and I realized that this was the life that my grandmother and my mom and her siblings were supposed to have led. And I didn't realize how hard that meeting was for her until at the very end, this colleague said to my grandmother, you've suffered immensely, and I'm sorry for that.

And then when we got back home, she spent the night weeping. So the image that she saw was the image of what her children's lives could have been like if your grandfather had stayed in South Korea. Exactly. So after that trip, I promised her that I would find him. And then she passed away six months later. Wow. So you wanted to go find your grandfather to find some resolution of why that photo wasn't the photo of your family.

Yeah. To find some resolution of why that photo wasn't the photo of your family. Yeah. So in the summer of 2015, I decided that I was going to go to North Korea to both visit North Korea. But my other hope was that I could actually finally find out about my grandfather. And did you tell your mother that you were going to do this and that you were going to try to find him? I did. And she was opposed to it. So she told me not to go. And my father was opposed to it. And he told me not to go. Their insistence was that the past mattered very little. They were both worried about the possibilities of me being kidnapped in North Korea. But I said,

of me being kidnapped in North Korea. But I said, okay, I'm glad you told me that, but I'm going to go. And they were fine with not probing any further. So I submitted a family reunification application and I had included all this information about my grandfather, but I had heard nothing back from them. I thought, okay,

maybe he's deceased or maybe they don't know his whereabouts. And so I thought it would be still an important trip for me to go to where I could actually see North Korea firsthand. And so I ended up flying to Beijing from LA and then from Beijing to Pyongyang. So I arrive at the Pyongyang airport, and our handler for the trip looked at me and recognized my face because we had to submit our photos for visa processing. So she looked at me and she said, Comrade Sylvia, we found your family. Wow. And I didn't know how to respond

because I wasn't prepared for that response. So a few days later, I meet with this government official and he tells me that they found my grandfather and then tells me that he died in 1987. But the government official also then told me that a few years after he had disappeared, he remarried and that he had children in North Korea and that I had all of a sudden these aunts and uncles

that I didn't know about. So the government official asked me if I wanted to meet this family in North Korea and that I had all of a sudden these aunts and uncles that I didn't know about. So the government official asked me if I wanted to meet this family in North Korea, and I said, absolutely. So I met them a few days later. We'll be right back. So a few days after that meeting with the government official, I, along with my two friends and our handler, left our hotel in our chartered bus, and we drove to another hotel to meet my family in what ended up being a reserved banquet room. my family in what ended up being a reserved banquet room. And as we were getting off the bus,

my aunts and uncles were waiting there for me with flowers in their hands. And they looked at me and we all started sobbing. Wow. My eldest aunt on that side looked at me and said, what took you so long? We've been waiting for you for over 50 years. That's a pretty remarkable thing to hear, since you have been waiting for answers

and they've been waiting for you. Right. Yeah, I think that both sides were hungry for information about the other side. So what happens? It's awkward. We just look at each other and start crying with very little words exchanged.

exchanged. But with a little bit of time, things started to get a little bit more comfortable, and they started to tell me stories about my grandfather and what their lives were like in North Korea. And they're asking very specific and direct questions about my mother, her sisters, my uncle, wanting to know what they do, how many nephews and nieces they have in the U.S., these sorts of both mundane but also very practical questions.

Did they seem familiar to you? My youngest uncle there looks like a spitting image of my uncle who now lives in the United States. They have the same complexion. They have the same mischievous glint in their eyes, too. I saw a version of my mom in the face of another uncle. So I could see a lot of family resemblance that was uncanny for me. So we have a lot of family photos of my grandfather. So I brought the photo of his marriage to my grandmother. And I brought a couple of other photos, and they had never seen a photo of their father before 1950.

The last image that I had of him was as a young man in his 20s and 30s. And they showed me photos of him in his 30s, 40s, 50s as well. So you'd never seen a picture of him after the 1950s? They'd never seen one before the 1950s? No. So it was like as if we were on the same timeline, but ours got cut off in 1950 and theirs began in 1950. So after you all get a little more comfortable with each other and swap these photos, I assume you ask them if they know what actually had happened to your grandfather. Whether he was kidnapped or whether he intentionally left your mom's family. Yeah.

So what did they say? The way that they tell it is that he was going to some conference in Pyongyang and went with a colleague. And apparently the borders were actually in flux at that time people could move back and forth but after the conference as he was trying to head back home the borders shut completely and he wasn't able to come back the other thing that they told me is that he waited five years before remarrying because he thought he could get back to South Korea and wanted to. And he also ended up remarrying a woman from Seoul

who was also stuck on the wrong side of the border. So from what your family is telling you in this banquet room, you're getting this answer that you have long craved about what actually happened. And the answer is that he got stuck, that this was just horrific timing in a terrible war, that the border was sealed and he couldn't get back. Yeah. couldn't get back. Yeah. Alongside the photos, they brought his diaries to share with me. And one of the diaries is dated 1950, August 26. So basically around the time that he left and they started to read from it. Hmm. Wow. Yeah.

And in it, he describes his deep sorrow and asks out loud what happened to his children and to his wife and to his mother. And in a couple of the passages that they read to me, he asks my grandmother to please live, to stay alive. He asks that his children stay alive so that he can come back and see them again. And there's various passages where he repeats this both deep regret and this deep fear that his children are going hungry or that his wife is going hungry and struggling and that he can't do anything about it.

Also, there's one passage in which his colleague shows him a photo of his newborn baby. And he's reminded that he left behind a three-week-old son. The other thing that my aunt had said is that, you know, her father would repeatedly tell her that if it hadn't been for the Korean War, she would never have been born. Wow. So on one hand, it was great to hear that he loved my grandmother and his children that he left behind. But I could also hear and see what that meant for our North Korean family. Mm-hmm.

That they must have experienced a kind of grief knowing that they were a second best, an alternative to what he yearned for back in the South. Yeah, that they were the second family that he didn't really choose to have, but had to by circumstance. And they, I think, carried that with them as well. They told me that as he lay dying, that he refused to close his eyes because he had not been able to say goodbye to the family and the son. So after five hours of meeting in this banquet room, we parted ways, but before parting ways, I promised that I'd come see them again, knowing that the likelihood was probably pretty small.

And I promised that the next time I came to see them, I'd come with my mom and my aunt and my uncle, knowing that the likelihood of that was also very small. And they waved me off goodbye as I got back on the chartered bus with my handler and my two friends. I have this vision of you leaving that room and calling your parents back in the U.S. and saying, you'll never believe what I just learned. Did you tell your mother what you found out? So we had no communication with the outside world for the two weeks that we were in North Korea. And so it wasn't until I got to the Beijing airport after flying out of Pyongyang

that I called my parents to tell them what I had found out. They weren't initially very excited that I had relocated the family in the north. They were not excited that you had found the family? No, but I think that my mother ended up relaying that story to my uncle and my aunt, and they were ecstatic by the news that I had found them. We decided that we'd have a small get-together at their house. Let's start. Okay. Okay.

Start. Start. Okay. Start. So a few months after I returned from North Korea, we all gathered in the family room of my parents' home. My cousins came, my uncle and my aunt came. My cousins, who don't live in the Bay Area, Skyped in.

And so there was at least 15 people in the room. They too grew up with the stories of this man who really cast a shadow over our lives and they too wanted to know what had happened to him. I told them that I promised my grandmother back in 2001 that one of my last promises to her was that I would find our grandfather and that was really a motivating factor. So that's the backstory. And I showed them the photos that our North Korean family had shown me. This is our cousin. This is our second aunt's son. And that's mom's face right there.

It is. It really is. Photos that I had taken with my aunts and uncles in Pyongyang. It's Wesamchun's eyes. Look, it's Bolle's eyes. and uncles in Pyongyang. It's Wesamchun's eyes. It's Bolle's eyes. And we got to look at their faces and try to trace similarities

between the siblings. So then my uncle starts reading from our grandfather's diary. Can you, could someone translate, please? So basically this diary entry says I'm eating apple, I'm eating tteok, I'm eating gindaetteok, and I think of how my wife, my mother, and my children

must be suffering and perhaps going hungry. He's like, my daughter, is now nine, my second daughter, Hye-young, is eight years old, mom, Woo-young, is now nine. My second daughter, is eight years old. Mom, is now seven. And is now five. When I think of this, how much my heart hurts. Is my family alive? My loving wife, please be living.

You must be suffering a lot now. My wife, please be living. You must be suffering a lot now. My wife, Hak-she, please live. I'm a terrible husband, but please don't die and wait for me. My father with children. Please live. Please keep living with your mom. I think of you all the time, and my heart hurts. When can I see you again? As I saw my uncle and heard my uncle read passages from his diary,

like all of us were moved to tears because you could tell that this flew in the face of all of the sorts of things that they had speculated on. Thank you so much. I appreciate it, Sylvia. I think that's enough. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

But each time I looked at my mother, I noticed that she was just sitting there very quietly in the corner with tears in her eyes. When we started talking, you described the toll that all this has taken on your mother, how it kind of hollowed her out in a way and left such a lifelong scar.

How do you think that that has changed now that she knows this? It hasn't changed anything. I think, had we known earlier, years ago, what had happened to him, but my mother is now 69, and so she's lived the entirety of her life with the assumption that this man had abandoned them. And so having this one bit of information, it has significance, but the weight isn't there because she spent her entire life thinking that

and knowing that she lived in a household without a father. I do wish that there was some closure for her, but I think she had already closed herself off to the possibility that there was something outside of this question of abandonment. And so after that trip, I was like, can we send them gifts or send them letters or can we go back together? She's made no indication or shown any interest of wanting to meet her siblings or to go to North Korea or visit his grave. So in part, I think part of what's motivated all of this for me is my mom's indifference.

And I see it as deeply tragic. And I've seen it as tragic for a really long time. So like her indifference, I think, has motivated me to want to pursue this as a quest. But I don't think this has changed anything for her. I don't know if that opportunity or possibility was ever there. Given everything that you have been through

and have learned about this really remarkable family drama, what do you think it would mean if North and South Korea officially ended the war that they are still technically in and that has ripped apart so many families over the past 70 years. A part of me doesn't actually think that reunification is possible, even though I've long held out the hope that it is. the hope that it is. I think that the implications for reunification are almost insurmountable. It'd be some version of the story many times over with people having to come to terms with the history of division, the separation of families. So I do hold out hope that reunification is there, but on one hand,

like I see a lot of challenges that would come along with what that would mean. The peninsula has been divided for over 70 years now. So even if I hold out hope that reunification is a possibility, I think that the result will be as unsatisfactory as my mom's response to the knowledge of her father. And I don't mean that cynically. I mean that just in terms of what sort of work and emotional healing and political healing that would entail. And so what does it mean to undo 70 years of division? And absence. Yeah, like it can't be instantaneous. What does it mean to undo 70 years of division? And absence.

Yeah, like it can't be instantaneous. It would require the undoing of seven years of separation. So I think that there has to be some real accounting for what that might look like and the implications of that. And do you think that reunification of North and South, that that could change your mom's decision? Could make her less reluctant to see this family. I think she's embraced the fact that she lives in the United States, and I don't think that she actually feels connected to Korea at all.

And so if there were reunification, I think it would facilitate meeting the family again, but I don't think my mother, that would change my mother's mind. Sylvia, thank you very much. Really appreciate it. Thank you. from their summit. South Korea says that North Korea has agreed to abandon its nuclear weapons if the U.S. signs off on the proposed peace treaty officially ending the Korean War and promises

not to invade the North. In Washington, skeptics are warning that North Korea has made similar pledges on numerous occasions in the past. Given all of the broken promises on the nuclear issue that we have seen under President Clinton, President Bush, President Obama, three different North Korean leaders now, can you really trust anything that comes out of a meeting with Kim Jong-un? In an interview on ABC's This Week, Trump's new Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, was asked if the White House trusts Kim's offers. This administration has its eyes wide open. We know the history. We know the risks. We're going to be very different. We're going to negotiate in a different way than has been done before. We're going to require those steps that demonstrate that denuclearization is going to be achieved.

We're not going to take promises. We're not going to take promises. We're not going to take words. We're going to look for actions and deeds. The Times reports that the talks between the North and South have actually complicated President Trump's role as he prepares for his own history-making summit with Kim in the weeks ahead. history-making summit with Kim in the weeks ahead. His two greatest bargaining chips are the threat of crippling sanctions and the use of military action. But a good relationship between North and South could make it harder for the U.S. to justify either.

That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Barbaro. See you tomorrow.