MY UGLY DUCKLING

“Heyy! You know what?! Hyunji had kissed six times in her life! Six! Isn’t that amazing?!”

It was around two in the morning when my phone started shrilling. Rousing my sleep, it rang and rang until I answered the phone. Praying for the phone call to be a short one, I answered a bit annoyingly. And that, the kiss-issue thing, was the answer.

“Wha…what? Hyunji? Six?”
“Oh, comeon! You remember that bony little girl in Virginia we used to know? She’s got sooo much beautiful! Gosh! She told me about this hot guy named Chris! She said she had to step on his feet in order to kiss him because his head was high up in the air!”

Then, finally, I could notice who she was. My sister! My sister who’s a year younger than me! The one who went abroad three weeks ago all by herself!

“That’s amazing! I mean… That’s impossible for me at least. You know what I mean.”
“Sure, sure. Yes. But school restriction is nothing. They still do all those things, you know, hanging around having some close physical contacts and all…”
“True to some people. Sad.”
“Well, anyway! You know what people here told me? They said I’m pretty! Adorable! Can you believe that?”

Her voice sounded excited, more than I’ve ever heard. She’s never sounded so happy in her 15 year life, as far as I remember. Amazing, I thought. How could she change so much in 3 weeks?

The night before she left to Virginia, she and I talked all over the night, until the dim sunlight shined on our face. She was deeply concerned about her life in America-how she would speak in English so well, how she would make all those friends, how she would catch up all those school learning stuff. It then seemed like she was too worried about going to America alone. It seemed as if she was forced to go there by someone. But actually, it was my sister who ‘importuned’ my mom to let her go to America alone.

My sister always had troubles with her in Korea. It doesn't mean that she's troublesome, it's just she doesn't fit into Korean society so well. Although she didn't have any problem with making friends and all, she hated to go to school. Classes were getting her off to sleep. Instructive lectures were simply too boring for her to stay awake. She lost her desire to participate in class naturally, and this directly affected her test score. For a 'mathematic-girl', memorizing several textbooks was just too much. When she totally gave up with her Japanese class, she had to pay harsh for it. Her Japanese grade turned out to be 'F'. Other than these 'ridiculous' school issues, she had a bigger issue in her mind. This hidden issue was hidden deeply in her wounded heart. It was the 'inferiority complex'.
We have a younger brother, who is about six years younger than us. He was a cute, dear child from his birth. Being the youngest boy in our family, he was always fondled and loved no matter what he did. As for my sister, who had been the youngest little girl for seven years, my brother was a real pain in her neck who took away everyone's love from her. But since she knew this childish jealousy wasn't to change anything, she kept this feeling to herself.
Another thing is about me, a sister year older than her. My sister and I used to everything together. We went to same school, same institutions, we went to Canada together, played in the same orchestra. We even had same beds, same desks, in the same room that we shared. The thing is, she is a bit different from me. Going to same school, institutions, and over to Canada together, we had different outputs. My iBT score were up 30 points after staying in Canada, while hers never did. School report cards showed differences in grades between my sister and I. She could never be in the same class with me in private institutions. This never meant her was not as good as me. She was a lot better than me in solving complicated math problems. She had a brilliant intuition which made an outstanding understanding in physics. She showed significant talent in designing. It's just, her talents never had an opportunity to be shown off. They never had an opportunity to be recognized by adults, even my mom.
The last part was her appearance. She didn't have big eyes. She didn't have a sharp nose nor a lily-white skin. She didn't have double eyelids. She wasn't large of limb. Koreans, obsessed over attaining a more Western look, considered my sister's appearance 'plain', or even sometimes, 'ugly'. Even my family never spoke nice about her appearance. Just like other teenagers, she cared about her appearance with her whole heart. However, people's fixed thought left a deep complex in my sister's heart. She wanted to be loved by people. She wanted to be loved by our parents, but it just seemed like she was an 'ugly duckling' with a plain face, miserable exam grades, and rude behaviors.

So, it was so good to hear my sister's vigorous voice on the phone. We talked for an hour and a half as if to catch up after three-week separation. We chatted as if to share everything, even the most minor things in the world. We chatted on and on until both of us fell into silence.

"I gotta go. I'm going out for a late lunch."
"Sure. I gotta go to bed. Or else I'll oversleep and miss wonderful Sunday breakfast."
"Right...It's almost four in the morning there... Oh! And last thing."
"What is it?"
"Happy birthday, InHee."
"Thanks. Love you."
"Luv ya, too!"


I could see an ugly duckling throwing herself at the flock of swans. I could see an ugly duckling being welcomed, loved by the flock of swans. And I could see an ugly duckling spreading her beautiful large wings and taking flight high in the blue sky.

Miss you so much, liz♥

Are we moral?

This was the essay I wrote last semester.(it seems like last semester was the only time in my life which I wrote so many essays;)The topic was 'Are human beings moral?' and my answer, since I had to pick one clear side, was 'No'. Well I surely think humans are moral in some ways:)


Between ‘Human Beings’ and ‘Morality’

‘Noblesse oblige’ seems to be the ‘universal’ phrase. Originated from French, this phrase is widely used in America, Japan, Korea, in their newspapers, magazines, books, and even TV. Then what does this phrase mean? Noblesse oblige means, literally, ‘nobility oblige’. But its general usage is the figurative term; ‘the moral obligation of those of high birth, powerful social position, etc., to act with honor, kindliness, generosity, etc’. What comes along with this phrase is numerous ‘nobles’ trying to show their morality.
It isn’t just ‘nobles’ who are trying to be moral. Simply everyone tries to be moral, but human beings aren’t exactly ‘moral’. Here, morality refers to ‘a standard or a rule that one ought to follow in accordance to consciousness of individuals, public opinion, tradition, etc’, and being moral refers to ‘living up to morality’.

To start with, humans have so-called ‘emotion’. Humans have their emotion from people to people, situation to situation, and time to time. Emotion hinders from viewing a situation (or a condition) objectively and accurately. Emotion hinders, furthermore, from acting right and reasonable behavior in accordance to one’s judgment. And therefore, humans are not moral. Say there are two people, A and B, who are friends of each other. A has a greater output than Bin pretty much everything. Naturally, B would feel jealous of A. In this case, would B be sincere and honest, with his (or her) full heart, towards A? No. Likewise, as long as humans have emotion, they are not moral.

Moreover, humans have ‘reason’. Humans have the ability to judge and discern things unlike other animals. It is the ‘reason’ we have. Based on our ‘reason’, humans judge which is beneficial to us and which is not. Thus human reason tells us to choose the thing that is beneficial to ourselves. That is, moral things are not considered in the first place according to human reason. For instance, there is a man who is in a hurry because he might be late for important appointment. He is desperately heading toward the meeting place, and finds an injured dog bleeding on the street alone. There are two choices; saving the dog by taking to vet and be on the right time for appointment. His reason would probably tell him to choose the latter one, while the moral one is the former one. That is, human reason takes the beneficial one rather than the moral one.

Finally, humans don’t know what exactly is ‘moral’. As defined earlier, moral varies tradition to tradition, people to people, and time to time. For an individual, morality is constant collision between one’s own consciousness, public, and tradition. A line between moral and immoral is very uncertain. Let’s take a look at Chinese foot-binding, Chanzu. Chanzu is old Chinese tradition that binds the feet of young girls painfully tight to prevent further growth. Women who followed Chanzu, or other people who forced these women to follow Chanzu would probably have followed the ‘tradition’. Apparently, nevertheless, Chanzu is wrong in ethical sense, such as female rights and freedom. Therefore, humans are not moral.

As a matter of fact, people strive to be moral. They attend to various community services, donate their property, and try to be considerate. But humans are never moral, as long as their emotion and reason are there. Humans are never moral, until they truly know what ‘moral’ really is.

Forming Creativity

A century ago, there was a man with white, frizzy hair. He liked to sprawl out on the bed, enjoying his world which he was the ‘Creator’ of it. Nothing seemed impossible in that world, and he let everything be as he conceived. On one typical day, he was wandering about in ‘his world’, dream, wildly. In the dream, he was in this marvelous spaceship. The spaceship sailed across the space at the speed of light. Swishing by billions of stars, he reached the point he couldn’t go any farther. He had reached the end of the space! Awakened by his own raptures, he drew inspiration, and eventually, set up a new milestone of human history. His name is Albert Einstein.

People who explain the importance of ‘education’ in developing creativity uses this example over and over again. They say if Einstein didn’t have understandings on ‘physics’, ‘mathematics’, ‘astronomy’ or whatsoever, he wouldn’t have been able to draw the theory of relativity. Surely, this is true. Without his brilliant understandings on science, he wouldn’t have been able to understand the theory of relativity, even. However, it just seems to me that these people are actually the one who got their creativity completely killed by ‘education’. Or they’re just too lazy to think any further.

Let’s just replace the name ‘Albert Einstein’ with ‘Steven Spielberg’ and read the first paragraph again. Even if we put another great man’s name instead of ‘Albert Einstein’, the first paragraph makes perfect sense. Steven Spielberg could have startled the world by creating a marvelous SF film with the same dream. Fryderyk Chopin could have made the greatest impromptu piano song with the same dream. Pablo Picasso could have envisioned a fantastic painting, consonant colors floating on canvas, with the same dream. All these great men have one thing in common: they were all summits in their field. When a melody, image, or scene popped up in their head, they had the ability to make those into a masterpiece. This is why we definitely need education in order to develop our creativity.

There are millions of schools in the world. There are millions of kinds of education in the world. Among those ‘millions’ of schools and education, some might be unhelpful to our creativity. Children learn how to write letters neat, how to choose the right answers in multiple-choice questions and how to memorize certain facts in public elementary school. They learn how to organize one’s essay into the ‘five-paragraph, introduction-body-conclusion’ format in middle school. They learn how to get high scores in SAT and other tests in high school. It seems like standardized public education simply kills creativity, but it really doesn’t. Public schools don’t ask us to have all same handwriting. They only ask us to memorize important concepts in the textbook. ‘Five-paragraph, introduction-body-conclusion’ format is the basic format of essay that we should learn first, and getting high scores in SAT doesn’t mean we have to have all same essay writing style. Even public schools respect creativity inside their standardized face. Needless to say, individualized learning contributes to creativity definitely. They respect our ideas even more, and raise our ability to a higher level, so that we can throw our ideas into shape.

We all have a lump of clay, and we shape our own feature in our life. We learn how to make certain shapes with clay in public schools. Then, individually, we learn how to make certain features specifically. What feature do we shape? That’s the part we have to choose. If one chooses to shape a banal figure just by using basic skills he/she learned from public education, the clay would just be a hackneyed piece. Without education, we won’t be able to shape our clay creatively. We won’t be able to feature our inspiration.

Children often amaze adults with their new, absurd (and sometimes whimsy) ideas. They view this world in their own way. But this isn’t the whole part of creativity. On the potential of creativity, we have to build up knowledge and develop our ability. This is when the potential of creativity turns into actual creativity.

Bloody Products

This is one of essays I wrote for Mr. Johnson's class last semester. It's not revised yet.

    Chocolate, coffee, cell phone. These are some representative words you can think of when thinking about 'exploitations'. I actually heard some people fighting for human right (especially of those who are socially challenged) by boycotting those products. For sure, many companies producing chocolates, coffees, and cell phones, as we all know, are exploiting labors. It is literally wrong to do so, and they, the companies, have their responsibility for it. The company needs huge amount of labors to collect cacao fruits, manufacture it, and wrap it. These jobs, requiring agile and small body, just fits for African boys. They are easy to take (probably there are more desperate things than human rights). They easily get dazzled by money because they are economically challenged. For all, it might be efficient. Still, this exploitation is certainly to be criticized. Those innocent, young laborers are to be protected. They are some who we need to take care of. It is a clear obligation for all of us, both morally and socially. Exploitions are to be criticized.

     However, it is not that 'companies are the only one to be criticized'. We can't just blame companies, not respecting their own conditions. The world we live is based on capitalism. This means money is intervened in any deal, any occurence, and any relationship. Everyone wills to buy products in cheaper price. Nonetheless, many manufactured goods these days don't usually have a specialized quality or other notable characteristic. Especially for chocolate and coffee, which the biggest part of the price is the name value (or the brand name), the most crucial part to win in the competition is the price. What shall companies do to reduce the price? They all have similar resources, capitals and all. This is where they get to choose exploitions. They extort labors from the weak. These behaviors weren't even criticized by media till recent days, till the world started to pay attention to human rights. This is called a 'structural violece'. We expect the company to make productions in a cheap price, not caring much about how they're going to make it, and then blame them for exploitions. In short, it is not only the company who has to take responsibility of the exploition. As a member of this society, and by the fact that structural violence is also one contributing factor of the exploition, we should take responsibility for this together, work for it, and get rid of it.

     Thank you:)