We’ve been packing all weekend. This is the first time Adam and I will actually be prepared for a move. I think we may finally be growing up a little. :).
I have two days left working at English Village. We had a really nice farewell party last night, and now we’re really ready to begin the next thing.
See you on the flip side.
-Jessica
For a year now, Adam and I have lived less than a mile from the most heavily fortified border in the world… ever. Today, we are participating in the 40 Day Fast, and we want to talk a little about North Korea.
(Both photographs were taken from the same hill.)
Photo 1: Adam and I live in the valley beyond the hill behind me.
Photo 2: Looking across the Han River to North Korea.
Where we live in Paju, South Korea, the air is clean, the hills are beautiful and lush, and dense rice paddies fill every valley. Parents wearing designer clothes drive their new cars to bring their children to their schools and private after-school academies, stopping for fast food on any stretch of road along their way. The stretch of highway leading to the next town of Ilsan runs along the pristine Han River. Only a few miles further South, lies Seoul, considered the “Miracle of the Han River” and the second largest city in the world. Seoul is a huge, wealthy, modern metropolis.
However, look through the barbed wire, just across the river, and you see an unreachable land. Despite our close proximity to North Korea (the entire Korean peninsula is only as large as the American state of Minnesota), there isn’t a more distant place. Looking through binoculars from the “Unification Observatory” in Paju, we can glimpse the rolling hills across the river, cut bare for better surveillance of the border.
We can also see the propaganda village which was built in the river valley to show South Koreans that their northern neighbors are living comfortable and rich lives. The only problem is that the North Korean government could not even afford to complete this village. It looks like a bombed out ghost town. The empty shells that are supposed to convince us that everything is okay do the complete opposite. If they couldn’t even afford to finish this important PR move, how well is the real population of North Koreans living inland?
We have heard so many rumors, but of course we can’t see for ourselves. Kim Jung Il, the dictator is feared by his people. He and his late father, Kim Il Sung demand adoration as saviors, perfect men, ideal leaders of the perfect society. But while South Korea grew from poverty to wealthy metropolis in fifty years flat, North Korea has gone from bad to worse. The totalitarian government and the complete isolation, combined with widespread floods and droughts in the 1990s have made life extremely bleak in North Korea. People are starving, they live in fear, there are public executions, prison camps, curfews.
Amnesty International says,
Reliable figures on North Korea are difficult to obtain, given the lack of access and barriers to information gathering. Estimates of the number of deaths that resulted from the 1990s famine vary widely, ranging from 220,000 to 3.5 million. Some sources claim the famine destroyed between 12 and 15 percent of the total population. Economist Marcus Noland recently estimated that the famine resulted in the deaths of between 600,000 to 1 million people, out of a pre-famine population of approximately 22 million (between 2.7 and 4.5 percent of the total population). However the social damage was much higher if one considers the fall-off in the fertility curve caused by famine.
– from an article entitled “Starved of Rights: Human Rights and the Food Crisis in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea)”.
The thing is, I don’t know how to help. Refugees caught in South Korea and China are sent back into the fire. Additionally, the minimal aid that is sent in, funnels through the corrupt people in power. Many South Koreans even fear a future reunification because the utter poverty and decades of brainwashing would flood into their borders and weigh heavily on their newfound affluence. It is a heavy and difficult situation that has spiraled out of control because of its shroud of shadowy secrets.
Please join us today as we pray for the people within the fortified borders of North Korea.
“Children of the Secret State”, a British documentary from 2000
Part 1 (10 minutes):
[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=FVA4kgVGmX0[/youtube]
Part 2 (10 minutes):
[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=Dm5xiFwnOSg[/youtube]
Part 3 (10 minutes):
[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=LQUipc28cwA[/youtube]
Part 4 (10 minutes):
[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=toOi1_7aNmM[/youtube]
Part 5 (5 minutes):
[youtube]http://youtube.com/watch?v=NEIv9gcLmt8[/youtube]
Other resources:
“North Korean Starvation Detailed” Seattlepi.com
“Starvation Threatens Millions as Aid to North Korea Dries Up” Times Online
“Scores of Children Dead in North Korea Famine” CNN
-Jessica
Being the only child of two extremely loving and adoring parents, pride and self-inflation are perhaps some of my greatest struggles on the spiritual path. I’m not alone though, this is the last and deepest obstacle for all who walk on two feet in this world.
Seeing who we really are, and living in light of that reality, could be said to be the whole point of this human being thing that we are all doing.
I’m both comforted and challenged by these tremendously accurate and insightful words from Thomas Merton:
“€œIt is almost impossible to overestimate the value of true humility and its power in the spiritual life. For the beginning of humility is the beginning of blessedness and the consummation of humility is the perfection of all joy. Humility contains in itself the answer to all the great problems of the life of the soul. It is the only key to faith, with which the spiritual life begins: for faith and humility are inseparable. In perfect humility all selfishness disappears and your soul no longer lives for itself or in itself for God: and it is lost and submerged in Him and transformed into Him.”€Â
- from €New Seeds of Contemplation
-Adam
Columbia College Chicago : Home
Great-looking art & photography school in Chicago. I’d never heard of them before. Interesting option for further studies…
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
It seems that SAIC offers an MFA in Photography. When I was in high school I dreamed of going to SAIC.
Home - Enterprise Centre for the Creative Arts (ECCA)
Great creative arts business resource.
a-n The Artists Information Company: Stimulating and supporting contemporary visual arts practice
Really thorough resource concerning the business of being an artist.
How to Change the World: How to Write a Business Plan: Ten Questions with Tim Berry
Here’s another fantastic quote from Father Thomas Keating that I thought was worth sharing with all of you:
“If we refuse to think of anything except what we are doing or the person that we are with, we develop the habit of being present to the present moment. In a way, the present moment becomes as sacred as being in church. Far better to be present to your duty if you are a bartender, than to be present in church and to be thinking about being in a bar. At least you are present to yourself when you are paying attention to what you are doing.
“Attention, then, is a way of doing what we are doing. It cracks the crust of the false self (our psychological awareness of daily life) in which we are the center of the universe while everything else is circling around our particular needs or desires. This is an illusion, but unfortunately it is the heritage we all bring with us from early life.”
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Did you know that you can make real negatives from a digital file to print in the darkroom the old-school way? I had no idea. When I have time and money, I’d like to try this.
Check out Adam's Voiceover Site:
Voice123.com - The Voice Over Marketplace
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