Such a unique yet heartwrenching scene played out in Korea yesterday (Tuesday, 20th October) as numerous families separated for decades due to the (technically still ongoing) war between North and South Korea reunite.
During the Korean War, millions of people were forced to be separated from each other and have since been banned from crossing or communicating across the DMZ border. Some of these families/relatives/loved ones haven’t seen each other in over 60 years.
“I really want to say the word ‘father’ out loud,” he said in an interview with Seoul-based news website Newsis. “I have missed him my entire life.” He wanted his father to take his mother’s hand and apologise for the years she had to spend without him, he said, and for all the hardships she and their son endured.
Jang-gyun added that while his father managed to start a new family in North Korea, his mother struggled to make ends meet, working on a farm during the day and as a tailor at night.
Just you try to remain dry-eyed as you watch the emotional video below:
Their time was to be painfully brief. They were granted permission to be together for only 12 hours, in group and private sessions, until Thursday (22nd October), when they will have to part again. On Thursday, an additional 90 elderly South Koreans will cross the border for another round of 3-day reunions with 188 relatives in the North.
The program, which allows reunions of family members separated by the 1950-53 Korean war, is organised by the South Korean Red Cross. There have been about 20 reunions, limited to only a couple hundred people. since 1985.
Sources: HuffPost Korea, NY Times, akp, DMZ Wiki / Featured image from Yonhap.
