The Island of Sea Women(18)

“I wish you two girls could learn to read, write, and do basic math, because it will help you if, in the future, one of you becomes chief of a haenyeo collective,” she told us. “If I can save up enough money, I’ll pay for the two of you to come to school with me.”

That sounded far more dangerous than marching in a demonstration, because the women who’d been arrested were being held precisely because of what their education had inspired them to do. But I wanted whatever Mi-ja wanted, and she wanted to go very much. My mother was her only hope.



* * *



Eight months after the Hado-led demonstration, Mother, Mi-ja, and I were once again doing farm tasks in our dry field. Weeding is awful—bent over all day, being wet to the bone from rain or sweat or both, the tediousness of the precision required to pull out the intrusive plants without damaging the roots of those we were growing. Mother led us in a call-and-response song to keep us distracted from our discomfort, but with Mi-ja by my side I could never complain too much. She’d become adept at fieldwork after toiling so long with us. Mother paid her in food, which she always asked Mi-ja to eat in our presence. “I don’t want your aunt and uncle consuming the results of your labors,” Mother said.

We weeded and sang, not paying attention to the world outside the stone walls that surrounded our field. Mother’s hearing wasn’t good, but her peripheral vision was sharp, and she was alert for all dangers. I saw her leap up, with her hand hoe held before her. Then she dropped the tool, collapsed to the ground, and rested her forehead on her folded hands. All this I registered in seconds.

Beside me, Mi-ja stopped singing. I started to tremble, petrified, as a group of Japanese soldiers strode into the field.

“Bow down,” Mother whispered.

Mi-ja and I fell to the ground, imitating Mother’s supplicant position. Terror heightened my senses. Wind whistled through cracks in the stone walls. A few plots over, I could hear singing as other women did their farm chores. The soldiers’ boots crunched through the field as they approached. I tilted my head so I could peek at them. The sergeant, recognizable by the polish of his boots and the insignia on his jacket, flicked the stick he was carrying, slapping it into the palm of his other hand. I lowered my eyes back to the dirt.

“You’re one of the troublemakers, aren’t you?” he asked my mother.

My mind scrambled. Maybe they’ve come to arrest her. But if they knew about her involvement with the demonstrations, they would have come for her already. Then my mind spiraled to a darker possibility. Perhaps one of our neighbors turned her in. These things were known to happen. The right piece of information could bring a family a sack of white rice.

“Let the girls go home,” Mother said, which, it seemed to me, was hardly a proclamation of innocence.

It may have been something else, though. I was only ten, but I’d already been cautioned about what soldiers could do to women and girls. I peered up again, needing to get a sense of when I should run.

“What are you growing here?” The sergeant nudged Mother with the toe of his boot. Her body stiffened in what I first took to be anger. She’d proved her strength by becoming a haenyeo chief, so inside she must have been getting ready to fight them one by one. But then I saw the way her clothes vibrated on her body. She was shaking with fear. “Answer me!” He raised the stick above his head and brought it down on her back. She swallowed a scream.

Behind the sergeant, other men yanked up plants and shoved them in satchels looped over their shoulders. This invasion wasn’t about my mother’s activities. Or doing bad things to Mother, Mi-ja, and me. It was about stealing our food.

The sergeant raised his stick and was about to bring it down again when I heard Mi-ja whisper in Japanese. “Please don’t take our plants by their roots.”

“What’s that?” The sergeant pivoted toward her.

“Pay no attention to her,” Mother said. “She doesn’t know any better. She’s an ignorant—”

“I’ll cut some leaves for you,” Mi-ja said as she started to rise. “That way the crop will continue to grow, and you can come again.”

Silence grabbed the men’s throats as they took in what she’d said and how she’d spoken. Her Japanese was clear in tone. She was lovely in the way we’d heard the Japanese liked—pale, delicate features, with a natural subservience. In a flash, too quick for Mi-ja to tighten her muscles or try to move out of the way, the sergeant struck her bare leg with his stick. She dropped to the dirt. He raised the stick above his head and brought it down again and again. Mi-ja screamed in pain, but my mother and I didn’t move. One of the soldiers fingered his belt buckle. Another one, biting his upper lip, retreated until his back was against the stone wall. My mother and I remained completely still. When the sergeant’s fury had worn out and he finally stopped whipping Mi-ja, she lifted her head.

“Stay down,” Mother mouthed.

But Mi-ja kept moving, pulling herself to her knees and raising her palms upward. “Please, sir, let me harvest for you. I will pick the best leaves—”

The men were suddenly as paralyzed as Mother and I were. They watched, as still as the ancient stone grandfather statues that could be found dotted around the island, as she struggled to her feet, then bent to peel off the outer leaves of a cabbage. With her head bowed, she offered the leaves to the sergeant with both hands. He wrapped his hands around her wrists and pulled her closer.