“So how do we get this koonghap test?” I say.
“We go consult a fortune-teller.”
“How’s it work?”
“They say marital compatibility is determined by your saju, the four components of your destiny dictated by the year, month, date, and hour of your birth. Fortune-teller deciphers your nature based on the saju and analyzes them according to ohang.” Seeing my blank face, she says, “You know, wood, fire, earth, metal, and water.”
“Right. And you believe in this stuff?”
“That’s beside the point,” she says, shrugging. “It’s Korean custom, centuries old, and it helps achieve harmony in the family.” Another puff. “Besides, it’s interesting watching these seers fumble around, guessing my character and making things up.”
Beethoven’s Ninth comes streaming through the lounge speakers, a bit louder. The “Ode to Joy” fills me with amorous courage.
“You make it sound fun. Maybe we can go sometime.”
“Maybe. Just make sure you have your birth info. On lunar calendar.”
“Korea time or Eastern Standard?”
I think I see a trace of another smile.
Jee Yeon stubs out her cigarette. It takes me a long minute to grasp she’s signaling our meeting is over. Just when I was getting the hang of it.
I pull out my StarTAC, and we exchange phone numbers. I tell her, as casually as I can, we should see each other again.
Jee Yeon gives me a half-bow, and I bow back awkwardly.
“By the way?” she says, on her way out. “Captain Ahab is one of my all-time favorite characters. Up there with Heathcliff. Dark heroes are my thing.”
The revolving door turns noiselessly in her wake, round and round.
8
Fall 1976
We arrived in America in year of two hundredth birthday of the country. Everywhere red, white, and blue American flags with neat rows of many stars. Americans very proud of their homeland, even though most of them it’s not land of their home. From Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Czechoslovakia, but everybody call themselves American.
Teacher put me as mate with American boy, Ralph Parker. He look like American, blond hair, pink skin, big nose. So nice in American way, smiling to me a lot. I smile back a lot. He ask me if I like baseball. I say yup, and hamburger too.
American Ralph teach me how to read and pronounce hard to say words. Girl, world, and hardest, Laurie. He show me to play American football, different from football I play. Why it’s called football when foot not touch ball so much?
Ralph invite me to his house for American meal. His home very big, very old house in a place with gates called Llewellyn Park. Hard to pronounce. Paint on outside falling off, wood floor creak when I step. I hear violin playing always at Parker house, pretty but so sad music. I ask Ralph who is ghost playing violin. He say his dad, Mr. Parker, and he play something called Mendel’s Son. Sound like moans in wind. Dinner is pork chops with apple sauce. Parkers drink the milk with dinner. Milk, not water! We sit on wooden bench and eat on old wooden table in kitchen. Big house, but no one dine in dining room.
Ralph’s sister called Laurie, not sure older or younger. English strange language, not tell if older or younger sister. No noona or dongseng. Or older or younger brother. Maybe Americans not care so much about relationships. Laurie has the yellow hair and yellow eyebrow. One day when Ralph not in room, Laurie pull up her shirt and show her small breast at me. Ralph come back in, and she put finger on her lip, so I say nothing. Next time I see her, she smile strange. Our little secret, she tells me. Ralph has older brother, I know older because he has hair on face, he play something called ice hockey. He play with big friends on Parker Pond. They have big shoulders and strange gloves. He is scary hyung.
I become Shane to schoolmates. Very American, easy to pronounce. Every time Ralph and I say bye after school, he say “Come back, Shane!” And he laugh, ha ha ha. Ralph introduce me to his friend Michael D’Ario. Michael tell me he’s Eye-talian. He look and sound very American to me.
One day he invite Ralph and me to his home for Eye-talian meal. We have spaghetti and meatballs. Mrs. D’Ario keep sprinkling cheese on my spaghetti. It’s so stinky, worse than any dwenjang I ever had. But I keep eating and taste not so bad. I think I’m getting American.
In those days, Appa drive us to school in huge red Ford LTD. Appa say, Why come to America to drive small Japanese car?
*
I love American TV. We have nice Zenith color TV. I can stay in front of TV all day. I watch every day Bugs Bunny, Brady Bunch—“Marcia, Marcia, MAR-cia!”—and Gilligan’s Island. I like Marianne with pigtails in hair in beginning. Then I like Ginger, even if she talk funny, like out of breath. I want to be smart like Professor, dress like Thurston Howell the Third. Every night, I wish for them and Gilligan to get off island, but not really.
I like most I Dream of Jeannie. Jeannie has powerful blink. She can do anything for her master Major Tony Nelson, like magic, but he not want her to do it. In America, shame to have things done for you. Maybe it goes against what Appa call American can-do spirit. Tony Nelson is very American, he’s astronaut (never heard of any astronaut in Korea) and very gentle. Jeannie not American, she from Basenji. But she not speak Basenjian or Farsi, she speak perfect American. She can because she’s genie.
Jeannie live in small bottle, but she pop out anytime to serve Master Tony. “Your wish is my command.” Jeannie can do simple things with blink. Big things she need to fold her arms in front of her Arab bra and snap her head. Jeannie with her bouncy American breasts, even though like other Americans, she from another place. She also have the golden hair just like American girl. She does not at all look two thousand years old. No way—maybe twenty-five at most. Poor Dr. Bellows, always foiled. She’s done it to me again! Jeannie too clever for him. She’s genie after all.
Sad day in my life when Jeannie marry Master Tony. Why she did it? Her family back in Basenji against, and I’m against. Does she really, gulp, love him? Or she had to because ancient rule to serve lifetime the man (what if girl?) who release her from bottle? Maybe not her free will. Maybe a genie’s destiny. But this is America, land of freedom! Still, Major Roger Healey feel hurt and jealous like me. I can understand Major Roger. Who not want magical American Jeannie? In my country, we have ghosts. In America, they have genies.
One night I dream of Jeannie. I rub bottle and she come out with hiss and smoke and say I am master and my wish her command. I tell her that’s OK, I don’t want to be master. Jeannie’s hair turn brown, she look like her evil twin sister Jeannie, and she say, Then I will be your master. Then evil Jeannie pull me hard and kiss me, her tongue go down my throat, all the way down there. I feel her tongue on my thingy, I tell her stop. But she not stop, her tongue wrapped around my thingy like snake and squeezing. She say, Your wish, your wish. Her American breasts pop out of her Arab bra and bounce, up and down, boing boing. She lift me up with her in NASA rocket, up up up, I feel pressure up against my face. We reach top, then we plunge down, spiral into ocean. When I wake up, I feel strange and my underpants and sheet all wet and Elmer’s Gluey. This is first time I have dream in American.
9
Mid-January 1998
Faces blur and voices become a dull roar, and I have to focus to orient myself. Back in the United States; New York, midtown Manhattan, Citywide Bank office, Thames conference room. Wood-paneled walls, the conference table dark and luminous as the sea on a clear night. I haven’t slept in seventy-two hours.
Director Suh’s visage comes into view, along with the rest of the Mop PTFT, jet lag melting their faces as in a Salvador Dalí painting. They’re surrounded by a horde of lawyers and bankers, all in dark suits. I imagine these professionals getting ready for work in the morning, putting on their suits and ties. Each of them, like generations of serious working men before them, tying a noose around his neck to go to work. Choking himself to a slow death.
From the noise around the table
I make out something about “the Rock” and a “change offer.” ROK, Republic of Korea. It comes to me, in fragments. A meeting to hammer out the terms of the debt exchange offer. Banks from around the world involved in the exchange, over two hundred of them, represented by the dozen lead creditors in this room. You can tell the commercial bankers from the investment bankers. Commercial bankers are the ones in earnest Paul Stuart suits and Rolexes, Piguets. Investment bankers wear Huntsman suits; bespoke, not custom-tailored, Charvet shirts (French cuff, bien sûr); Hermès ties; and, to show they’re above conspicuous consumption, plastic Timex Ironman watches. It doesn’t matter, a noose is a noose. I feel mine pulling tighter.
The bankers are balking at taking a “haircut,” a discount on the face value, on the debt. One of them with a raspy voice can be heard over the others.
“Why should America Bank get penalized?” he says, finger poking the air. “We at America Bank a) rolled over our credit to stop the bleeding, b) extended the rollover by another month, and c) are now stuck holding degraded Rock paper.” Both kinds of banker like to talk in bullet points, not complete sentences.
“The lenders in this room,” another banker says, in dulcet tones, “from here and the UK and Germany, have been generous in extending liquidity to the Rock.” Everyone knows the banks were forced into their rollover, arms twisted by the New York Fed and the Bundesbank, for fear of a systemic global credit meltdown.
“We did it because we have faith in the Rock government to do the right thing,” he adds helpfully.
The usual bad cop/good cop routine, acted out for the benefit of the Korean officials.
Director Suh sits impassive, arms crossed, lips curled down at the ends. After nearly every meeting with bankers, he tells me, “Americans talk too much.” To him, all Westerners are Americans.
I sit in a back row, along with Jack and the other “minions,” as the Monkey likes to call us. The integrity of my sleep cycle has been compromised, and I can barely keep my eyes open, much less follow the discussion. Two all-nighters and then thirteen hours gained somehow in the air between Seoul and JFK. Einstein was right: time is a tricky little bugger. I close my eyes and hold my breath, nearly succeed in blacking out.
I’m jolted awake by the familiar sound of Tom Brogan’s gruff voice from the front of the room. He’s one of the few investment bankers allowed in these proceedings; he’s one of their own. Jack is sure Brogan is one of “the Kappa Beta Phi secret hand-shaking mofos.” The Grand Ass-Wipe, for all we know.
“Gentlemen, do you know what we’re looking at?” Brogan says, in the direction of the Korean officials.
The Koreans look blankly at one another.
“I’ll tell y’all what we’re looking at,” he says. “We’re looking into the abyss. The Rock has fifteen billion in debt to international banks coming due in the next two weeks. Your sovereign debt has been downgraded by Moody’s and S&P. You’re down to two-point-five billion in FX reserves.” He pauses, for effect. “If we don’t get this debt exchange done—right goddamn now—there is no rescue program. Your fine country is going into default. A.k.a. the shitter.”
Every deal has its own language. Figuring out the ever-changing grammar is the key. Linguistic fluency is a necessary but not a sufficient condition. Going into the shitter is pretty well near universal language.
Gandalf of Sterling, who’s been sitting quietly, is not to be upstaged. “And you banks,” he says, standing up. “Let’s face it. All of you made a bad credit decision. You need to suck it up and accept the penalty.”
“What kind of a haircut we talking?” a banker asks.
“Who determines the pricing?” another says.
“—critical to have price discovery—”
“—just get the Rock government to guarantee our debt—”
“—no, the market has to decide—”
“—try a Dutch auction—”
“We cannot,” Suh says, evenly. “Our new president will not accept open pricing.”
A pall of quiet falls over the room.
Finally, William Path, the self-proclaimed éminence grise of Citywide Bank, stands up. He has sparse white hair with a sharp part, and he wears a yellow bow tie. “Gentlemen, gentlemen,” he says, the voice of reason. “The Rock government will not get an open pricing mechanism past its parliament. We need a negotiated solution.”
The word negotiated is the sound of a chime in the woods, clear, ringing.
“What kind of pricing we talking about here?” someone asks timidly.
“Say, two-twenty-five bips over LIBOR for the one-year loans,” Path offers. “Two-fifty over on the two-years.” There’s some grumbling around the table. “Really the only way to get this done in the time frame required,” he says, ever the statesman. “Then we can move on to the bond offering, get eight to ten billion in new capital in the Rock’s coffers.”
They go back and forth on what they start calling the Thames Plan.
“Even if we agree to this Thames Plan, the banks here own only 35 percent of the debt,” someone points out. “How do we get the other hundred-eighty-seven lenders to sign on?”
“The abyss!” Brogan reminds everyone.
Several people start talking at once. The voices in the room overlap, grow louder, English mixed with German-inflected English and bad Japanese English, a Tower of Banking Babble.
Umma once told me an old folktale about a newlywed couple living in the countryside. The husband had to go to town for some business, and the bride asked him to buy her a woman’s comb. Knowing how absentminded he could be, she pointed up to the moon, a thin crescent of light in the sky, and told him, if he forgot, just look up at the moon, and he’d be reminded of the shape of her comb.
Several days later, after finishing up his business in town, the husband remembered he had to get something for his wife. Recalling something about the moon, he looked up and saw a full moon lighting up the sky. He went to the nearest shop and asked the shopkeeper, “Do you have something for my wife that looks like the moon up there?” The shopkeeper saw the round moon, and he said, “I have just the thing.” He brought out a silver hand mirror. “The new thing for young women,” he said. “You look into it, and you can see yourself, so you can get prettied up.”
Happy with his gift, the man returned to his village and gave his wife the hand mirror. She looked into the smooth glass, and what did she see there but a pretty, young woman! “What’s the meaning of this?” she cried out. “Why have you brought another woman back from town?” She ran out into the yard and, breaking down in tears, said to her housekeeper, “I asked for a comb, and he brought back a strange woman.” The elderly housekeeper said, “Let me see, ma’am,” and took the mirror. What she saw was the face of a wrinkled old woman. “Why, it’s just an old woman.” The mistress took the mirror back and showed the image to the housekeeper. “See, it’s a young woman,” she cried.
While the two women went back and forth, a boy came by, chewing on a stick of taffy. He was curious, so he took the mirror and peered into it. There was a boy eating his taffy. “Hey, give me back my yut,” he yelled. “It’s mine!” He raised his arm to strike the boy, and the boy also raised his arm, ready to fight. The boy started crying loudly. Just then, the village elder came by to see what the fuss was about. “Let me see that,” he said, taking the unfamiliar round object. “Why, it’s a grandfather,” he said, heatedly. “You should be ashamed at your age to be meddling in a fight between boys.”
As the old man angrily shook the hand mirror, it slipped from his grasp and dropped to the ground. The glass shattered into a hundred pieces. The old man, the boy, and the two women all fell silent and stared at the broken glass at their feet.
I look around the conference room, and the faces are jagged reflections on a hundred shards of glass. They have idiot grins, lupine eyes; they look dark, disjointed, desperate.
A whiff of cigarette comes from the back of the room, and I recognize it, Marlboro. I br
eathe it in, then hold it, try to recapture the smell.
I wonder if you can retrieve what is lost. Abuji, his Marlboro smell. Umma singing her plaintive folk songs at the kitchen sink. Our old house in Seoul, with its dirt front yard, where I used to play ttakji. The pinwheel on the handlebar of my bicycle spinning bright colors in the breeze. What if we had stayed?
I hold my breath in, just a bit longer. Can you have a memory of what might have been?
The voices flicker, and I feel myself getting smaller, fading into the past.
10
Summer 1977
I gotta tell ya, I love my New York Yankees. Their nickname stands for Americans where I’m from, but here they belong to New York. The Bronx Bombers, sometimes called the Bronx Zoo Animals. Their cool pinstripe uniforms, the N over Y logo, the Yankee Stadium cheer, “Let’s go Yan-kees, bum-bum-bada-dum.” Billy Martin, Catfish Hunter, Reggie Jackson—Reg-gie! Reg-gie!—and my favorite, Thurman Munson. Big, bad Bombers, with their bushy mustaches, they’re the American cool.
Thurman is captain of the team, but Reggie says he’s the straw in milkshake, because he’s the slugger and he likes to stir things. America is the land of sluggers, and Reggie is the biggest slugger of them all. Well, maybe greatest after Babe Ruth, a really fat slugger from a long time ago named after a chocolate bar. Thurman had a fight with Reggie, and Reggie had a fight with the manager Billy. Punching your manager! It could never happen in Korea, never ever. Only in America. Land where big, mustached sluggers can beat up who they want, even their teachers.
Those Yanks are always fighting, but doesn’t matter, because they’re awesome anyway. We kick the butts of the hateful Boston Red Sox. Red Sox suck. We’ll lose to them when pigs will fly. Boy, I really hate that Carlton Fisk. He had fight with Captain Thurman too. Yankee fans cheer when players fight. With Thurman and Reggie and Sparky, with bubble gum in his right cheek, we’ll go the whole way this season. We’ll win World Series, and we’ll be champions of the world! Not just of America but the whole world!
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