Viva, grandma
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By Kim Jin-hyun
Su-min's grandma says that she has never been happier, even though her big family all lives together. This is mostly because her daughters-in-law treat her as their own mom and each of them are eager to help each other.
Nevertheless, this year, she encouraged her first son to move out of her home, because her grandson's school is far from her house.
But her real intention was to free her daughter-in-law from the boundaries created after living together for nine years. Moreover, Su-min's mom now speaks Korean fluently and grasps Korean cultures well.
After our school entrance ceremony last year, an elderly lady, at a glance, dignified and kind though she was over 70, visited my office. She said that because Su-min's parents were too busy, she came instead, asking me to look after her grandson.
The grandma had three sons. The eldest, Su-min's dad, had a serious traffic car accident and suffered from depression. When he was 9, his dad divorced and lived alone.
The younger son, while working as a civil servant, was also in a car accident that left him severely disabled. Therefore, he gave up his job and spent most of his time at home. The youngest also had a chronic disease.
One day, Su-min's grandma decided to find wives for her two sons and visited the Philippines with them. She helped both of her sons find new wives.
After the weddings, she lived together with the newly-wed couples. She cared for her sons' health and helped her daughters-in-law overcome the difficulties associated with not speaking Korean by providing a sense of family community.
Therein lies a lesson called “Let's help each other.” In other words, we should permit ourselves to accept different values and cultures. Then, we would always encourage and help each other.
Jared Diamond, author of “The World Until Yesterday,” said that in modern societies the focus is on determining right and wrong rather than on restoring relationships, but for traditional societies, the key elements for restoring a damaged relationship is acknowledging and respecting each other's feelings.
Diamond said that even though we live in modern societies, most of our lifestyles are controlled by traditional values. Partly, it means that cooperation or consideration based on relationships is more important than individualism, which is praised as a virtue in modern society.
In particular, people born during the era of rapid industrialization in the 1970s, consider competition to be valuable. Su-min's dad and uncle were born during this era.
The grandma, born in a traditional age, became a bridge to both of her sons' couples while living together. For example, she not only helped her sons restore their relationship and awaken in them how to live happily, but also daughters-in-law, who were born in traditional societies, adapt to Korean society more quickly.
The Ministry of Gender Equality and Family reported that multi-racial families in Korea numbered over 750,000 in 2013. It said that among them 10 percent of partners divorced. Most of these were the result of violence, estrangement or alienation because of poor communication and different values between married couples. This means that they didn’t have a good relationship. From that point of view, I think that the way Su-min's grandma acted is very meaningful because her role as a catalyst encouraged her sons and wives to help each other by overcoming different values.
In Arabic, there is a proverb, “Ask yourself what's a good deed rather than the color of something."
Maybe, Su-min's grandma knew how to understand her daughters-in-law. Therefore, they could be a family and live together. Instead, their different color, values, and poor communication became secondary issues.
The writer is an English teacher at Yeosu High School in South Jeolla Province. His email address is shinykim60@hanmail.net.