#lauraling

At the start of the weekend on Friday evening, I posted a status update on Facebook lamenting two boring days ahead.

Just about an hour before Saturday approached, at 11pm while XY and I were at Starbucks 313 Orchard, I finished a book on predictions by Nate Silver – The Signal and The Noise and started hunting for my next read at the NLB Overdrive website when I stumbled upon – Somewhere Inside by Laura and Lisa Ling. That was to be the start of a quietly adventurous yet contemplative weekend…

  As the self-explanatory cover describes, this is a book about the American journalists who were captured by North Korean soldiers in March 2009, and eventually spent nearly five months in detainment.

This book is over 600 pages long on my iPad font & page width settings, and over 400 pages in print. I didn’t start reading it at Starbucks that night, but instead only began on Saturday morning. And by 1am Saturday night (or Sunday morning), I’ve finished the entire book. As far as I could recall, this was the shortest time I’ve ever taken to complete any book of considerable length.

The following morning, with the taste of the story still fresh, I went hunting for yet more stuff online related to the imprisonment and found a companion book by Euna Lee, who was the other journalist captured together with Laura Ling, sharing her experiences of the same ordeal. Incredibly, I finished the second book by 9pm on Sunday.

I have to argue that the Ling sisters’ book was the better of the two, simply because of the intertwining perspectives of one who was captured, and the other fighting to free her sister, whereas Euna’s book was much more self-centered just within her and her family.

The boring weekend turned into a highly self-reflective one because the stories from both books brought me deeply into the circumstances depicted within, and I’m not referring to only the two women’s mental torments. 

  North Korea and Our Governments

The original intent of Laura and Euna’s assignment was to film a documentary, bringing light to the difficulties faced by defectors who flee their native North Korea, only to find themselves facing more hardship in China, the nearest bordering country other than the heavily guarded Southern border. Because the Chinese government does not readily accept these refugees, they are often conned by middlemen and end up leading lives just as tough as back in their communist home. Some eventually make it to better lives, finding their ways to neutral grounds like Thailand, Vietnam or most dreamingly, South Korea; others, like women, get sold to rural farmers as wives.

Famine, poor human rights and lack of basic necessities such as electricity are just some painful reasons why many escape their homeland.

As much as Laura and Euna wasn’t able to complete the original documentary, I believe their books accomplished the same purpose. It saddens to learn of the lives of such unfortunate people and makes me treasure being in a well-run and relatively liberal country. We often lament how bad our government is in Singapore, but compared to these folks, we should feel blessed. Even the widely condemned Chinese government is way better in this aspect.

*These are satellite nighttime images of the Korean peninsula and neighboring China and Japan. Notice how brightly lit everywhere else is compared to the near pitch-black darkness in North Korea due to their lack of electricity 

  Treasure While You Can

In their books, both women bemoaned how guilty they felt putting themselves in such great risk, neglecting their families while fearlessly pursuing their careers. And how much they would treasure their loved ones if they were ever to be released.

Laura constantly put off starting a family despite how much her hubby, Iain, yearned for a baby; whereas Euna continuously hunted for her dream journalism job of speaking for the voiceless. In captivity, both of them came to realize how insignificant their careers were when their very survivals were placed on the line.

I’m a nasty bastard myself in many areas. Despite reading these stories, I never seem to learn the idea of treasuring while you have. And trust me, this isn’t the first time I’ve come across such “treasury” ideas, but it never seemed to get drilled into me. I’m not sure if this time is any different, but I’m hoping this journal will remind me constantly.

  Foreign Born Citizens

As some may know, Euna Lee was born and raised in South Korea. Her English though fluently spoken, carried obvious accents and wasn’t very easy to make out especially during noisy video interviews (on Youtube). Laura, though bred and born in California, was of Chinese descent. Both her parents were born and raised in Asia (Taiwan & Hong Kong) and her mum barely spoke English when she first settled in the US. Both were full citizens by the time of the capture.

Throughout Laura’s book, you could tell that the US government showed no hesitation when it required them to lower political pride to rescue the two women. Many more complete strangers rallied online and even staged vigils requesting for the North Koreans to pardon them.

My point is – had the same been here in Singapore, I’m certain many of the same would have happened. I’m referring to the government and people’s support. But I’m very sure there would be many, many more who would question the necessity in rescuing the non-local bred and born. Olympic medalists anyone?

I complain about foreigners in Singapore myself. And many of us do. We blame our government for allowing migrants. But will we stand together in times of hardship like these?

  I highly recommend reading both these books for anyone who enjoys fiction or biographies. For everyone else, if you are intrigued by what I’ve just written and/or have some time to kill, do pick up at least the Ling sisters’ book. Meantime, let’s take a moment to think about the 3 lessons I picked up from the books:

Complain about our government? Compare that to some others.

Family life. And the importance of treasuring your loved ones while you can.