[korean short stories]ham min bok, why are tears salty

Korean Short Stories

Ham Min Bok Why Are Tears Salty? 눈물은 왜 짠가?

Translated by An Seonjae

Information This work was previously published in New Writing from Korea .

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Why Are Tears Salty?

It happened last summer. It was while I was taking Mother back home to her sister's, after our economic situation had worsened until she had nowhere to sleep. Mother said, There's time to spare so let's relieve our hunger, let's go and eat some meat soup. Now Mother suffered from inflammation of the ear all her life; if she ever ate meat, pus would run from her ears. When I understood that she had suggested eating meat soup for my sake, the wrinkles on her brow looked even deeper. We went into a beef soup place and I wiped away the sweat running down my brow with a damp towel.

"The hotter it gets, the more you have to eat meat to keep the heat off. You need meat ...or plenty of meat broth, at least."

I had added flavoring and eaten five or so spoonfuls when mother called the owner. He came over, his head bent forward, anxious in case there was something wrong. Mother said she had put too much salt into the soup, it was salty, and asked for more broth. The owner readily brought more. As soon as she thought he was not looking, Mother poured the broth into my bowl. Embarrassed, I accepted the broth, glancing sideways at the owner. It was obvious that he had seen what she was doing out of the corner of his eye and was keeping his gaze averted. Finally, as a sign to Mother to stop pouring, I touched her bowl with mine. The clunk the bowls made sounded so sad for some reason that, in order to control the feelings rising within me, I hastily started chewing rice and radish kimchi with the soup. At that, the owner, taking care not to embarrass Mother, brought a good-sized dish of chunks of radish kimchi then withdrew again. For a moment, the tears I had been holding back spilled out. I made as if they were in fact sweat running down from my brow, and very slowly wiped the sweat from my eyes with a damp towel, muttering inwardly: Why are tears salty?

Copyright 2009 Literature Translation Institute of Korea

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