"A moment of impact"
When I came to South Korea everyone asked me if I'm scared because of the tension between North and South Korea and I said "NO". Today I could say that I'm a little confused about how to answer that very same question.
Yesterday was a ordinary day, nothing out of the ordinary was planned. I went to school and I got a lift home from work with a colleague of mine. The day at school was quite great since I was in touch with my creative side again in one of my classes and had a nice conversation with my other class which doesn't always happen as well as the boys one of my classes were themselves and as loud and misbehaved as always.
But as I'm a little sleep deprived this week because of the army drills performed by the US Army and the SK army I'm not that receptive to sudden changes in my area. The US Army and SK Army performed their tank drills through my hometown so I occasionally woke up at ridiculous hours of the night because of the vibration these enormous tanks caused. It sometimes feels like my bed will collapse or something especially when these drills contain around 8 tanks. And the noise is also part of the problem. I live really close to a bridge or actually I live right next to it and that bridge doesn't bring justice when it comes to sound... it acts as a big microphone speaker. Nevermind the amount of Army trucks and jets making their rounds. This week there is an announced Army drill taking place to ensure that everyone knows what to do if North Korea (NK) decides to fire.
After getting out of the car and walking home I heard these loud noises and I looked up to the ski thinking to myself "Please don't pour down on me now clouds". It was a overcast day and as per usual very humid and hot. And in SK we do get the occasional thunder and lightning storms so hearing a thunder-like noise doesn't really alarm anyone that much. It was strange to me though since normally in a thunderstorm the thunder does not follow directly after each other. There is normally like a short pause which wasn't the case this time round but I didn't make much of it.
Later the evening I spoke to my next door neighbor and she immediately asked me if I heard SK got bombed by North Korea. And all of a sudden the sounds I heard earlier made a whole lot more sense. I heard 3 bombs that hit the border or I heard 3 bombs being launched by the SK Army as a counterattack on NK. But our border got hit.
When I first got to SK I was quite frightened by all the military operations that was happening and today I'm scared in all honesty. Everyone seems to be quite relaxed about the whole affair and does not seem to really care about what's happening at the border. About a week or two ago two landmines exploded, allegedly planted by North Korea, costing 2 soldiers their legs. The SK army put up loudspeakers broadcasting anti- Pyongyang propaganda over the border. North Korea wasn't happy with this so they bombed the loudspeaker. In this recent bombing no deaths or injuries have been reported yet.
This whole affair made me really think about life. It's not everyday you hear something and feel extremely vulnerable and in the hands of somebody else's decisions. It made me realize that we are all living on borrowed time. Some would live to see their olden days, others won't be that lucky. We cannot go through life hiding away in bunkers protecting ourselves from ourselves since we could very well end up bringing end to ourselves. I thought to myself: " Have you said everything you wanted to say? Have you done everything you wanted to do? Have you told the people you love, that you love them today? Have you said sorry to those you have wronged? Are you living everyday like today is your last? Are you satisfied with what you accomplished in life? Is there anything you have put aside since you thought you still had time to do it in the future? If your life flashes back to you in the form of a movie, would you be utterly happy with it and give it a 5-star rating? Do you have the desired relationship with your God?"
If you could answer Yes to all these questions then you are probably not human. Nobody could answer Yes to all those questions. I know for a fact I can't.
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