Cousin Leaves for Airforce and A Visit to My Family's Hometown(예천)

On Monday the 21st, one of my younger cousin had to serve his mandatory 2 years of military service. He chose the Air Force, so he was to report to a city in the Southeast named Jinju (진주시). They aren't allowed to have cell phones or ipods for the first year, so he really didn't even bring anything. Everything he would need would be given to him by the Air Force. The air force academy had some sort of mini event while parents and girlfriends waited until their boy would be sent away. For some reason it seemed most of the people who were going to the air force were all wearing beanies, and I happened to be wearing one too. I had to have confused a few people who probably thought a foreigner was going to enter their armed forces. The time finally came and all the men had to report in to the air force. Looking around all you saw were moms, sisters and girlfriends crying, except for my aunt that is, she's tough and confident he'll be fine. He has a month to find out where he will be stationed and can't even use the phone, he can only write letters for now.

When we got back I checked my email to see I got accepted into Seoul National University's Language program. The semester is from March 3-May 9 and I have to take a test on Feb 27th to see which level I'm suited for.

On Friday the 25th, we had to go to Yecheon (예천) because my grandfather's cousin passed away. Yecheon is in the country side and my family's hometown. I was able to see the house where all my aunts and uncles grew up in. It brought back flashbacks from when I was a kid seeing the old style Korean neighborhoods. We attended the 'funeral' session, but it's a bit different from the traditional western style. I'll try to explain it better one of these days, but for now I'll just say it's indoors and there is a picture of the dead and candles around.

Afterwords we drove up the mountains and then had to walk up some more to see some of the old graves of our ancestors. Korean traditional graves have a mound piled above them. This was also the spot where my grandfather's cousin was going to be buried. I took some pictures while up there, but just from the pictures it doesn't make it seem like the elevation was that high, but it was.

My grandpa is very old himself and someday his time will come too unfortunately. He's lived through some hard times in Korea, including when Korea was under Japanese rule and also during the Korean war. I recently found out why he eats so fast, at first I thought it was kinda funny and that he was just a good eater. However, instead I found out a long time ago when Korea was annexed by Japan, they put everyone to work like slaves, including him and they only had 1 minute to eat. It's pretty sad that it still affects him to this day. I wish I could ask him some questions about his life back then, but I can't communicate with him well enough. Since he doesn't understand any English, it's hard for me to have a conversation with him other than saying basic sentence fragments. I have to pick up on Korean rather quickly before it's too late.