People's Efforts in 1997 _ Jookyoung Oh

 

Jookyoung Oh

Professor Michal Eskayo

ESLTING 100

November 2, 2022

 

People's Efforts in 1997

All the people in this story were about my age at that time, but they were all people who never gave up. On December 3, 1997, the South Korean economy crashed because people withdraw foreign capital was withdrawn a lot. In addition, many companies were closed, and Korea's foreign exchange decreased rapidly. The government was forced to ask the IMF for emergency funds. At that time, many companies were also closed, and many families experienced difficult economic conditions. This caused many of the oldest daughters and sons in the family to go and earn money to help their parents regardless of if they graduated from high school or not. Moreover, there were many cases where the heads of families who lost their jobs or suffered from them took their own lives. In addition, there were many unfortunate cases in which the family collapsed because of money. My grandparent’s and my parent’s generation were greatly affected by this financial crisis.

In January 1998, one of the most important effects was that my grandfather had to quit his business. He had been in the semiconductor business for a long time, maybe his whole life. However, during the financial crisis, he eventually quit the business because many employees around him committed suicide. My grandfather's old friends and close business friends also committed suicide because their businesses went bankrupt. Moreover, at that time, my grandfather invested a lot in other companies before the financial crisis. Eventually, the companies he invested in went bankrupt, and he incurred a lot of debt. Every day debtors came to my grandfather's company and house, so grandfather had no choice but to stay away from his wife and children for a while. Plus, my grandmother, mother, aunts, and uncles left their hometown of Seoul and hid in the countryside. My grandfather sent money to my grandmother money for living expenses. Eventually, my grandfather worked in a factory, then as a security guard, and as a bus driver. He did many jobs in his life. However, the money was not adequate for a family of five. My aunts were high school students, my uncle was an elementary school student, and my mother was a senior at the university. Thus, my grandmother had never farmed, but she had to raise tuition for my aunts and uncles by farming with the help of people around her neighborhood in the countryside.

In addition, after graduating from university, my mother interned at many companies to become an architect, but she had to give up her dream and become a bank teller during the financial crisis. Furthermore, my father said he entered the job he wanted after graduating from college due to the financial crisis, but he should have come out without getting paid. According to my mom, her university professor introduced her to a job where she could earn money quickly, but she didn't like the job. She thought touching big money was unfortunate. That’s why her father was in business, she doesn’t want to work with touching big money. However, she had to work as a bank teller to make money. My mother had two sisters and a brother, so she had to make money to take care of all of them. She was a daughter of a wealthy family. Additionally, she studied well and had a dream. However, as soon as she graduated from college due to the economic crisis, she had to work part-time and have a job as an unwanted banker. At that time, she told me that the world seemed to collapse. That is a reason why my mother sometimes says that she envies my life after graduating from a private art middle school, a private art high school, and a private women's university. Additionally, my father was also fired from his original job because of the financial crisis and had a hard time finding a new job. He studied hard and entered his first job, but he was fired from the company without getting his first salary because of the financial crisis. In Korea, there is a custom of giving the first salary to one’s parents, but my father couldn't say that he was fired without a salary to his parents, so he worked a lot of part-time jobs and gave the salary to his parents.

At that time, the government launched a four-month gold collection campaign. The government asked people to donate all the jewelry in their homes, such as gold rings and gold necklaces to the government. My mom had hurried to marry my dad in 1997, and donated all the gold in the house, including wedding rings, gold rings, and gold necklaces to the government. On the day she went to donate, she said she cried a lot and promised her husband to buy a wedding ring again when the situation improved. addition, it is a tradition in Korea to give a gold ring to pray for the child's health on their first birthday. However, my mother received a gold ring from her mother, but after my older brother’s first birthday party, she donated it to the government. My brother could only wear a gold ring together on my first birthday on November 2, 2002.

All the people in this story were about my age at that time, but they were all people who never gave up. In this incident, many people lost their jobs and many family members. Moreover, my mom and dad should have chosen a job that they didn't want. Fortunately, my grandfather's business picked up again after1998, but my mother continued to have nightmares even after my grandfather passed away. I am grateful to my parents and grandparents did not give up at that time, so my brothers and I can live well today.