| When my mom and dad knew that they were to | | | | the culture, but every time we'd see an American |
| be sent to work as missionaries in South Korea in | | | | TV show on the US military channel, I would long |
| the mid 1950's, the first thing they did was go to | | | | for that far distant country that was supposedly |
| school. They studied Korean language, history and | | | | my own. The Korean toys and dolls of 1968 were |
| church growth classes. For two years before | | | | so poor and uninteresting, and the clothes were |
| they even set foot on Korean soil, they were | | | | so odd when I compared them to the Sears |
| immersed in the preparations of a lifetime of | | | | catalog my grandmother would send us every six |
| service to the church in Korea. It was exciting and | | | | months. My siblings and I would dream of |
| dangerous and challenging for them to arrive with | | | | chocolate ice cream, American hamburgers, real |
| two little children (I wasn't born yet), to adjust to | | | | pizza with real cheese, everything American. In |
| that war-torn land. | | | | the process, I began to resent the fact that I |
| As years went by and I came along, their Korean | | | | was stuck in a third world country while my |
| language skills improved tremendously, my dad | | | | cousins got to have what I thought, was the best |
| could navigate through the most treacherous | | | | of everything. |
| streets in his Land Rover, negotiate out of a | | | | Only years later did I come to realize how |
| traffic ticket with any Korean policeman, and | | | | shameful my attitude had been, how much of a |
| befriend practically anyone he met. They were | | | | blessing it was to experience another country, to |
| constantly going to church meetings, grand | | | | have the opportunity to learn another language |
| openings of Christian schools, or new churches | | | | and to have the honor of being a part of the |
| out in the countryside, making long speeches | | | | work of God. I had a rich and extraordinary |
| surrounded with Korean church officials. The | | | | childhood, but in the cold winters with the air thick |
| church, the country, the service to those people | | | | with the smell of rotten fish from the open |
| was their life...but not mine. | | | | markets, with roads full of frozen mud puddles |
| I learned to love some of the food and parts of | | | | and lined with beggars, I just couldn't see it. |