Intermediate English Writing Ch.5
201200235 Kwon Hye-ji
Final draft
The Most Severe Winter of 1997
When I came into my uncle's house, I felt warm welcome by his smile. I could smell of food my aunt was making. It was almost dinner time, but we needed to wait for more than a hour to have a meal. She was preparing for dinner, so she showed me her face for a while to say hello and went back to the kitchen. As soon as I sat a brown soft sofa, he asked for an excuse to bring tea.
He was the oldest among five brothers of my mom. I visited him on national holidays like New year day and Thanksgiving day, Chuseok, every year, but I was always accompanied with my family. So, I felt a little strange and nervous after leaving alone in the big and familiar livingroom. But I became relaxed when I grabbed a cup of tea that he brought. When I smelt the tea, he broke the silence and talked to me.
"I got a call from your mother. She told me that you want to hear my story of 1997. I was surprised at first that you would come alone, but I understood your situation. You Must do homework, right? haha." I felt my face got red. "But the story would be more or less depressing. Is it okay?"he asked me with a little worry. I looked up his face. His hair was touched with grey and had fine lines around his eyes. Since I was young, I liked when he smiled, his eyes crinkling. His tanned face seemed to prove he went though a lot of adversity in his life. I lightly nodded and took a sip of red tea while waiting for his next words.
"It was a winter of 1997. I still remembered that the winter was severely cold. One day, I woke up and turned on the television. I was puzzled at the news coming out from the TV. It said the government applied to the IMF for a bailout. At that time, I could not expect how it would affect my life." I could still read his nightmare of that time on his face.
"It must have affected your life as well as the society," I said. He nodded and the sullen look shaded his face slightly as if he did not want to even think of it. "I learned that Korea suffered the worst financial crisis in 1997 in the history class, but I actually do not know how people's life changed."
"As the national treasury was empty, companies could not borrow money from banks to invest and pay workers' salary. So the companies had to reduce the size by a large-scale restructuring. As a result, 1.5million people lost their works." He set his face as if he remembered people crying who were fired at that time. As he said, he drew a long breath and continued talking.
"I was one of them. I had worked for a small company selling car gears to big companies but I was fired after a few days later when I saw the new." I did not know what to say so I was just listening to him attentively. "There are few jobs available for those workers who have been fired as part of restructuring. So, I ran around to look for a job until my shoes were worn out."
"Also, my family had to go outside to work. My oldest son worked for family even though he was just high school student at that time." He turned to a picture that his son was smiling. "All family went to work until I found another job. My son delivered newspapers evening morning. I cannot explain my feeling of that time. I felt sorry but my family cheered me up." I heard the aunt laughing from the kitchen and talking on the phone.
"Fortunately, a boss of my son introduced me to a publishing factory, after hearing my story. So finally we could be well off." He slowly got up from the sofa, went in front of his family picture and picked it up as if he wanted to keep it in his eyes. "Not only my family, but many people started to find and stability and to stand up from the dust, because they had to provide for their family who always trusted and encouraged them. We overcame the winter with warm love of family."
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