I previously posted about a soldier in Korea being asked by a lady to go home to meet her ajumma. I want to stress that the scenario that I painted in that post will almost never lead to anything beyond a live-in sex-for-money scenario. I say almost never, but there is an outside chance that marriage could ensue. Then again, I could also be elected President of the United States. Not very damn likely at all. This post follows a similar theme. Suppose you were a soldier stationed in Korea, and you were dating a girl but have no intention of marrying the said girl. Case in point. A few weeks after I arrived in Korea, one of the KATUSAs in the 5th PMU asked me if I would escort his sister onto the post to the club one evening. He explained I would be doing so only as a favor. His sister was not exactly a beauty model nor was she worthy of a paragraph in a letter home to the relatives if you catch my drift. Not exactly top-shelf merchandise. No sir. This same KATUSA came to me a couple of days later and asked if I could escort his sister onto post through the gate one more time. I tried to decline citing previous plans. But he insisted explaining that his sister was already waiting at the gate. What the hell? He was trying to take advantage of the fact that, generally speaking, I’m a nice guy. Come to find out, that wasn’t it at all. There was a whole other scheme at work, but it would take about a month to reveal its ugly little head. That night I learned two things: first that Miss Lee liked me, and second that she spoke relatively good English (better than her brother the KATUSA). The first revelation shocked the shit out of me, mainly because it came out of nowhere and I did not see it coming. It hit me like a freight train hitting a deer with a full head of steam and at 60 miles per hour. It might have given an older man a heart attack. The second revelation was only mildly surprising given the first revelation, but still surprising. Then, I learned the reason why. She said, “I attended Seoul University” and work at a textile mill, so I must know how to speak English. I speak good, yes?” “You speak well. I speak well… is what you meant to say,” I replied. “You go to Suwon with me Saturday?” “Will I go to Suwon with you? Where is Suwon? What is Suwon?” “Suwon is 20 or 30 kilometers south of Seoul. Suwon has an old Korean folk village.” “Oh, so sort of like a historical place?” “Yes.” “How will we get there?” “We will take the train. I will call you.” I thought, ‘This might be Okay.’ Oh hell no. I don’t even know what I was thinking when I said yes. The train she took me on was not the Blue train. It was not even the Green train. No, the goddamn train she dragged me onto was the Red train. The Blue train was top of the line back then, with the Green train in the middle, and the Red train was the worst of the three to ride on. That should have cued me to what lay in store. Nope. Ole blind as a bat Wright just ignored the alarm bells ringing and the red lights flashing. Totally ignored them. I had to stand for most of the ride to Suwon, and every Korean on that damn train just had to find some lame-ass excuse to bump into me and rub up against me. Why do you ask? I was the lone foreigner on that damn train. I might as well have had a hat, a mask, and a horse named ‘Silver.’ As if that weren’t enough, when the train finally arrived at Suwon, people stared at me like I was a monkey in a cage. It was damn unnerving and really creepy. I didn’t even have any goddamn bananas. Now I knew how the animals at the zoo felt. To her credit, Miss Lee picked up on how uncomfortable I was. No shit. After we toured the folk village, we quickly left and caught the train back to Seoul. I was happy to get the hell out of the ‘zoo’ as it were. Yeah. Being stared at and bumped into by about fifty to 100 people is far better than being stared at by thousands. Hands down. You know you’re a monkey in a cage when people are taking pictures of you and not of the historical buildings, they are there to tour and view. I could see them taking pictures of me if I were a big movie star like John Wayne or something. But I’m a nobody. About two weeks after the Suwon debacle, Miss Lee asked me the question all soldiers fear if they are not serious about somebody and have no intention of getting married. What is that question? Simply this: Miss Lee said, “I want you to come to my home to meet my parents.” The first couple of times she asked me this question, I came up with excuses for why I couldn’t go. Finally, I started dodging her phone calls and checking with the gate guards before I walked out of the gate just in case she was waiting for me. Basically, I was hiding from her. Finally, I got tired of hiding and faced the music, and I broke it off with Miss Lee. I tried to let her down easy, but basically, I dumped her like a sack of bricks. I met with her and said, “I am sorry Miss Lee, but I do not love you. I cannot go to your home to meet with your parents. Here is a gift. It has been nice knowing you.” Basically, I gave her a watch as a consolation prize and sent her packing. I think that the whole meeting in futility took about fifteen minutes to execute.
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