[Opinion] Sad Brothers

For a century, “Three Thousand Miles in Search of Mother,” originally written by Amicis, has been a children’s novel that moved both children and adults all around the world to tears. The story is the chronicle of a 13-year-old boy Marco starting a grueling journey from Genova, Italy in search of his mother who went to Argentina to make money. Children today, who ask their parents to drive them to schools only ten minutes away, would not dare to take the painful, bitter journey like Marco who leaves Genova to Buenos Aires, then to Cordova and finally arrives in Tucuman.

In the morning of January 22, Lunar New Year’s Day, two boys, aged 11 and 13, set off in Anyang, Gyeonggi Province to meet their father who was imprisoned in Nambu Police Station, Seoul after stealing clothes and food at a discount store a few days before. Since their parents’ divorce, the boys lived with their father. The boys, who starved for three days, managed to reach the police station after walking more than eight miles in the bitterly cold weather of 16.7 degrees below zero. However, they were not able to meet their father because he was transferred to another prison the day before. With 5,000 won they received from one police officer, the boys took a bus home and bought a bag of cookie to fill up their stomach. They had to spend New Year’s night at home without gas or water.

Recently in Busan, neighbors saved two boys, aged 2 and 7, who had been abused by foster parents in their twenties. The boys were sent to an orphanage last November when their biological parents divorced. A couple suffering from financial difficulties adopted the boys to receive 530,000 won monthly from the government. The foster parents left the children at home and went to their hometown for New Year’s Day. The boys had to shiver in the cold house for three days because their foster parents turned off the heater and left the children only with rice in the rice cooker.

During New Year holiday, some children in rich families received more than one million won from their relatives. Why did these four boys in Anyang and Busan have to spend such a cold and sad New Year’s Day? Why are there children who go on a journey of “three thousand miles in search of fathers and mothers” in this OECD member country that aims to achieve $20,000 per capita income? Before blaming the society, we should all solemnly look around us.

Editorial Writer Oh Myung-cheol, oscar@donga.com