The attached photo is of us at Kimpo airport waiting to board a flight to the USA. We all look miserable and sad because we are leaving life as we knew it back then. I remember the propeller plane, so loud. I remember waking up from a nap on the loud plane and heard my siblings talking to each other — hard for me to believe because they hadn’t spoken to each other for more than a year (and used me as a messenger when they needed to communicate).
Left to right: ?, Aunt Tamaye, Uncle Francis (in front of Aunt Gia), Grandma, Dr. Tae-Bong Kim, Teresa (my mom)
This photo was taken in 1954, the year after the Armistice Agreement.
Francis:
Onni,
The person between mom and Teresa is a chemistry professor where we took shelter for 3 months after the N. Korean troop came to Seoul.
Do you remember his name?
(My grandfather was already a professor in the United States at the outbreak of the Korean War, so he spent the entire war in the United States, separated from his family.)
Tamaye:
Kim Tae-bong, is what I remember. Does it sound familiar to you?
Francis:
That is correct. He is Prof. Kim, Tae-Bong, who had a stack of books, which we used to sneak in to take out to read during the refugee era in Seoul.