A certain alumni event

By Lee Sun-ho

On May 11, I was privileged to be invited to join the Boston College Korean Alumni Association (BC-KAA) dinner held at the Hotel Shilla in Seoul.

The meeting was specially organized by ardent alumni members of BC and hosted by Christine Ahn (class of 1983), a professor at Sogang University, and her banker husband Charles C. Ahn to welcome the Seoul visit of President Fr. William P. Leahy, S.J. and his deputy on the ceremonial occasion of the 50th founding anniversary of Sogang University which shares the common mission of Jesuit Catholic higher education with BC.

Until I was invited to the BC-KAA function, I didn't expect that I would be able to meet over 80 participants at the party all of whom are BC graduates residing in Korea. They are engaged in different brackets of diverse white-collar jobs in Seoul.

The lively G-generation youngsters of BC alumni, almost half-a-century my junior, mostly finishing four year undergraduate courses, seemed to be very enthusiastic about the alumni activities for their alma mater.

They also have close contacts with one another back home from BC. There was one BC-KAA couple married last September, and such a union could exist at any time.

Quite a number of BC-KAA members use English first names, as shown in the case of Matthew Kim (class of 1985), CEO of a manufacturing company who plays a leading role in BC-KAA. The main sponsors, the Ahns, Christine and Charles, became parents of the university as their son is enrolled at BC now.

Youthful BC-KAA members were surprisingly attentive to their alma mater.

A video presentation on the school that evening reminded me not only of the Chestnut Hill campus in Greater Boston and the atmosphere of faculty-student immersion in the desire to have empowering college days, but also the traditional athletic activities of BC, especially American football games and men's ice hockey matches.

For the more than four decades since I returned home in the mid-1960s, I could find very few people in Korea educated at BC. Due to my age of over 70, the oldest among the dinner participants that night and my bygone BC campus life at Chestnut Hill, Mass., between 1964 and 1966, I was naturally in the spotlight as a rare oldster of having ``asked and answered questions" seemingly like a black swan coming from the external world.

Above all, Father Leahy was interested in listening to tales of my student life at BC as a foreign graduate student in the mid-1960s. I conversed with him about the scenic Jesuit campus called Eagle Heights at Chestnut Hill long before the present-day expansion of the site and the up-to-date reorganization of many buildings through renovations.

I told him, ``Not many students from the Orient could be seen at the school during the mid-1960s unlike the 72 undergraduate students from Korea nowadays." I also said, ``Commuting from my residence in Newton Corner to the Chestnut Hill campus was done mostly by bicycle during the school semesters."

On the other hand, BC-KAA youngsters, some the age of my grandchildren, were curious about my studies at BC even a couple of decades before they were born. I mentioned, ``Strenuous qualifying examinations for studying abroad given by then Ministry of Education of Korea were an obstacle. Both Korean history and English had to be passed at any rate."

Korean history was much more difficult to pass than English for liberal arts students."

To answer questions on why I chose BC, I said, ``At the inception of Korea's economic development plans in the 1960s BC kindly allowed me to come from a then underdeveloped Korea on a full tuition scholarship. That was why I chose BC Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for my further study,"

I candidly told them, ``I had to put up with language barriers for a couple of years not only in English for the two-year graduate work but also in French for the second language requirement test to receive my master's degree in economics at that time."

Father Leahy and his companion kindly brought some BC brochures, campaigning for financial aid and undergraduate admission information for Korean applicants.

I hope the university's motto from Homer's Iliad, ``Ever to Excel" remains with every member of the BC community throughout the world a challenge yearning for greatness in all realms of human endeavors.

As a fountain of learning, BC has experienced a tremendous growth in recent decades, ranked 34th among universities in the States by U.S. News and World Report. I am sure BC will accept more freshman admissions for applicants from Korea hereafter.

It is my earnest wish that all the members of BC-KAA from the younger generation continue to display a vigorous passion for their alma mater, prosper in their individual professional fields in the global community, and eventually light the world as BC's 150th anniversary (slated for 2013) campaign signifies.

The writer is an outside director of Kunwha Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. in Seoul. He can be reached at kexim2@unitel.co.kr.