by Don Mee Choi

Mr. Ahn was a political prisoner from 1953 to 1995. He currently lives in a farming village within the Civilian Control Zone, on the South Korean side of the DMZ. The CCZ was created by a US Army commander in 1954, after the Korean War, and it remained relatively unpopulated till the 1980s. The new settlements in the CCZ are commonly referred to as “DMZ villages.” To enter the DMZ village near the city of Kimpo, west of Seoul, I had to pass a guard post manned by young soldiers. I also observed seemingly endless barbed-wire fencing across the rice fields. Ahn, now in his eighties, remains a North Korean sympathizer. Every time a missile is test-fired in North Korea—usually before or after the massive biannual, joint US and ROK military exercises—Ahn is placed under house arrest. I recorded Ahn and also scribbled in my notebook while listening to his life story at his house on December 23, 2016. I remain a daughter of neocolony.

. . . May of 1957 . . . we started a hunger strike . . . there were 367 of us . . . someone said 368 . . . but I know it was 367 . . . we all signed on and organized the strike . . . first round, second round, third round, fourth round . . . we were beaten indiscriminately . . . our hands tied back . . . the guards still used Japanese words . . . lost our consciousness . . . and were thrown into solitary cells … threw cold water at us … when I woke up I was still alive … sounds of torture . . . second round . . . indiscriminate beatings . . . many dropped out . . . after the third and fourth and . . . indiscriminate beatings . . . everybody gave up . . . only 8 of us went all the way … we were ready to die … when your stomach stays empty for long … we were near starved to begin with . . . it churns . . . as if someone’s cutting it out . . . my comrade was in so much pain that he passed urine … only a few drops … nothing in him to come out … so we said … if you want to live, eat … we gave him water … in August someone from Central Intelligence came . . . suddenly our food ration was upgraded . . . you could even buy extra food if you had money . . . we could exercise . . . no one died from malnutrition anymore . . . all the prisons nationwide . . . but they kept the pressure on . . . torture . . . indiscriminate beatings . . . for instance . . . if you dropped your chopsticks or rice bowl . . . What’s that signal? . . . What’s that code? . . . they beat the shit out of us . . . they demanded meaning . . . meaning . . . yet meaningless . . . it was impossibly absurd . . . for instance . . . if you accidently dropped your wooden pillow at night . . . You signaled! . . . this comrade of mine was too frail … I said I was the one … these guys still used the Japanese word for a shotgun . . . my arms were not long enough . . . for a loop … for a shotgun to be tied … so they did it this way …