IEW / draft in ch.4 / Sujeong Seo

Remembrance about a Mountain

 There was a time when I wasn't fussed about my face getting tanned. The little girl with worn-out sandals had a lot of fun under the sunlight. My tight ponytail usually got loose when night came. What I enjoyed most is neither seesaw nor swing. There was a little mountain near my house and my mom always asked me why my sandals looked like trash covered with soil. Almost every day I climbed the mountain like a squirrel. I can easily find so many diaries that I wrote about the mountain in those days so I think I can deliver my story clearly.

 The reason that I first went to the mountain is that I was too shy to play in the playground. In the early summer when I was nine years old, my family moved to a village in Anyang in which there were many apartments and schools. Children on my block were so close to each other that they didn't let me in their group. Once I was whimpering because I couldn't fit in with the girls. My dad lifted me up in his arms and went to the mountain. It smelled fresh summer mountain and the wind blew so softly. It was calm like as another world. There were dead leaves which covered the mountain so whenever my dad took a step forward, I heard the sound of rustling. Going more inside the valley, I could see some raspberry trees. My dad put a ripe red berry in my mouth and it tasted sour sweet. In his arms, I looked around the mountain until the tears on my cheeks got dry. Probably I was consoled and healed in there.

 After the visit, my interest was no longer the girls in the playground. When I came home from school, I threw off the school bag in my room and went into the mountain. It was not steep so I could easily climb. There were few or no people at that time so I almost owned it. I felt so cozy. I collected unique shaped stones or leaves and picked berries that looked edible. When green leaves were trembling in the breeze and the sun was shining through the trees, I firstly felt that nature was so precious and beautiful.

 But my mom didn't want me to go to mountain and she hated my collections like acorns or wood sticks that I gathered. One day she noticed that I played alone so she called her friend who had a daughter in our neighborhood. Then my mom told me to go her friend's house and hang out with the daughter. But I was already a lonely wild girl in the mountain so I felt burdensome. Whatever my feeling was, the next day my mom dressed me up with pretty skirt and pink shoes and I headed to the house. When I arrived near there, my courage failed me. I hanged around for a while and finally went to the mountain again. I was too accustomed to play by myself in the mountain. 

 As time went on I felt guilty and scared to go back home. So I began to go more inside the mountain. The skirt and shoes were not suitable for the mountain and my feet hurt. I should have stop moving when I found some green chestnut burrs. I naively thought that they were unique and climbed up the hill to pick them up. I put carefully the unripe chestnut burrs in my bag. But my pick shoes were not careful as me. I slipped and my right hand accidentally grabbed a burr. The thorns were stuck in my soft skin. My hand started bleeding and I was awfully painful. I flopped down crying loudly.

 Time passed and it was beginning to get dark. Fear paralyzed me but I knew I should go down. I managed to calm myself down and took a step slowly. The chestnut burr was still attached on my palm. Fortunately, after a few steps, I found a woman climbing up. As it turned out, the woman, the friend of my mom, was looking for me when I hadn't come. After she saw my palm with the burr, she was so surprised and called my mom loudly. Immediately they took me to a hospital. It is hard to remember how the burr and thorns were removed maybe because I was so panicked—my diary said that I had an operation for the first time.

 For several days I just stayed home and I met a new friend, Minju. She was the girl who I'd supposed to meet the very day. We got to be closer and hung out together in the playground. My mom didn't let us go to mountain and also I didn't want to go there again. But Minju knew that I used to play in the mountain and curiously asked me to bring her there. I really didn't feel like going but she was the first friend in the block. I took her the mountain. It was still beautiful without change. I felt that it welcomed me waving the leaves. Naturally I got close with the mountain again and Minju and I secretly played there without saying to our moms. I introduced my favorite trees to her and let her know the taste of raspberry. Minju liked the smell of mountain and feel of the wood grain.

 Now I thank her because if I didn't go to the mountain that time, maybe I would get a kind of trauma about the beautiful mountain. Still now whenever I met Minju, we talked about the mountain, and my mom remember the chestnut burr accident more lively than me. I wish the mountain is still there with my remembrance.