By Bill Capoun
Recently Seoul saw the tragic death at age 26 of Bill Kapoun, an American who was working here as a teacher when a fire took his apartment. Bill was someone who cared deeply about people and life. He also liked writing and his sister Laura gave us the following piece of writing, which he wrote not long before he died. She prefaced it by saying for its posthumous publication, ``My brother was an amazing individual. I think the world of him. Only he could express these thoughts so clearly, so beautifully. I hope that they will lift your spirits and inspire you to truly live.'' This is the first installment of a two-part series. ― ED.
I started this book approximately three years ago to the day as I now attempt to close it. I had never written seriously in my life and was essentially just putting down my thoughts and emotions after spending five months in Ireland.
The semester before I went to Ireland I had been living the life of a typical frat guy in a typical American college and was dealing with my first serious break-up. Going to Europe was nothing like what I had expected. I thought I was going to be partying and meeting girls all the time.
I thought I would be taking the life I had been leading in America to a new level. Instead I started a completely different life. I met almost no girls during those five months, I had almost no friends and I had almost no fun. At the end of that time I started reflecting on my entire life, on my past and on my future and I realized that there were many parts of it that were not at all how I had planned or how I wanted them to be. I saw large chunks of my earthly days completely wasted, unappreciated and unused and it sickened me. I started writing about it.
My writing was then immature as was my outlook on my life. I do not claim maturity or ability in either life or writing now, but I see myself going in the right direction in both attempts. When I first started traveling I spent a few days walking around capital cities with a stupid look on my face and a guidebook in my hands.
Today I spent my morning digging for clams in a mud bank on the Algarvan coast of southern Portugal before spending my morning trying to sell tickets to go dolphin sightseeing. Afterwards I went on a hike to collect almonds, oranges and sage to cook the mussels I collected off the shore (mussels are much easier to find than clams), which I cooked on a hotplate in my rented room, which overlooks the bay of a small fishing town.
So I have come a long way, as a writer, as a traveler and as a person. Or at least I hope. Only the reader can be the judge of that, but I hope that you will get some laughs, some tips, and maybe even some tears or inspiration from my trials and tribulations. Cheers.
That was life, when I wrote that. I was really living. Despair is life, pain is life. Life is when you have such a terrible realization that you break out in a sweat and suddenly your whole body is overcome by heat and all you want to do is cry out for someone, anyone to help, because you don't know how to fix the situation, and you just can't believe that in your bit part as a walk on character in this cosmic play that has been going on day after day, year after year, millennia after millennia, you aren't even capable of keeping yourself fed, out of the rain at night and, God forbid, happy.
Happiness is life, laughter is life, there are so many kinds of life, but I, like so many of us, did hardly any living, instead I spent most of my time looking forward, always anticipating, one day, yeah, one day, if I just keep waiting, planning, one day, I'll be happy, I'll be living.
And then one day became this day, and THE day ― the day that was that oh-so sought after the culmination of all my planning and waiting, and wasting of life ― would become one more day, one more day, waiting, waiting for tomorrow to come, waiting for my life to happen. Or if not waiting for tomorrow to come, I looked back, remembering the days I spent living, even the bad times, the boring times. (end of the first part)
A fundraiser in memory of Bill to start a fund for burn victims in Korea, whether Korean or foreign, will be held Saturday night at the Wolfhound, Itaewon. The goal is to try to reach the 11.5 million won still outstanding. A voluntary 10,000 won donation can be given at the door and 10% of sales will go to towards the fund.
For enquiries contact Warren Franklin at warren.franklin@gmail.com