To Swim Across The World

Posted by rjhmoore at 3:11 PM 1 comments
Monday, August 25, 2008

To swim across the world. What is the first thing that pops into your mind as you repeat that phrase in your head? I imagine something like a movie scene where there is a collage of different people and different lands in the background with a man in front, swimming as though he's escaping from somewhere, through a vast, dark, choppy ocean.

This is the title of the book I read, To Swim Across The World, and it is about escaping and facing brutal incidents in life. It takes place during WWII and the Korean War, in Korea. It is about boy and a girl, each with a family, that live on two different ends of the country and live two very different lives, that is, until their lives join together. The story pulls and tears at your emotions so that you feel like the events are happening to you, whether joyous or miserable. Trust me, it is one heart-wrenching experience.

Despite the brilliance of the story, it's the title that still grabs me. It encompasses the whole meaning of the book, each and every little anecdote. Both of the characters, Sei-Young (the boy) and Heisook (the girl), experience drastic changes in their childhoods that they handle with great courage, fear, cunning, and respect and it manages to get them "across the world" to the next episode in their lives.

Sei-Young is a poor boy living in Southern Korea while Heisook lives a privileged life in Northern Korea. They both have Christian ministers in their families, resulting in their lives being surrounded by faith in God. This affects many decisions they and their families make. Heisook believed in God her whole life until her older brother made her question his existence. "What about the Japs who are murdering Koreans as we speak? Are they God's creations, too? Is He to blame?... Do you think that you are a privileged Pang with a perfect fortune carved into your silky little palm because you don't question God, Heisook? Because you know your prayers by heart?... Forget about church. Forget about God. If He is so charitable, why does He let this old peddler, practically a beggar, stand here in the cold with paper bags for shoes?" Heisook doesn't know what to do with these words and her faith breaks, changing her affection for the Japanese into dislike, and her belief in God into doubt. She learns many secrets from her parents and her brother that change her whole view of the world. The two wars in her country leave her scarred, both physically and mentally. She crosses over from innocent and naive child to veteran of ugly truths and experiences.

Sei-Young never questions his faith, but he learns the crudeness of being poor in many ways. He realizes that his father spends his money on rice wine to curb his disappointment in life and leaves his two sons, wife, and father hungry every day. Sei-Young witnesses the bully and torture of his grandfather, by the Japanese, because he is a minister and leads other Koreans to God instead of Shinto, the god of Japan. Sei-Young suffers the loss of family members to the Japanese "war effort" and other unfortunate happenings. Many other horrible things occur throughout his time, but he pushes on through to make a better life for himself and his family. He starts as a skinny boy begging for work in the countryside to a strong young man working as the personal secretary to the president of South Korea. It is a large, but wonderful, transition in his life.

Eventually these two people meet, and the sparks fly. They share the horrible and beautiful transformations Korea has faced as they grew up. In the end, they go to America to begin new adventures and start a new life, though they never leave the old one behind. If that in itself plus their demanding and eventful pasts do not classify as "swimming across the world" then I don't know what does.

By the way, Sei-Young means "to swim across the world."