A long journey westward to Gwangju today. The city became a flashpoint in South Korea’s struggle for democracy in 1980, when the government brutally cracked down on those protesting the imposition of martial law. Similar to Taiwan, South Korea has had to reckon with a troubled past that endured well beyond Japanese occupation and civil war. Gwangju represents the most odious of a long litany of injustices perpetrated by the repressive military dictatorships that ruled between 1948-87. The entire city has effectively become a memorial to the tragedy. My tourism brochure highlighted twenty-nine historic sites to visit; I settled for four. My favourite was unsurprisingly the cemetery for those who participated in the uprising. I think you’ll understand why from the pictures. I leave South Korea tomorrow with the firm conviction that their remembrance of the dead is without peer.
I next visited some museums recounting various aspects of the uprising that don’t need detailing here. Suffice to say the protestors were brave and the soldiers were brutal. The museums were replete with macabre artwork that illustrated the tragedy’s profound impact on national consciousness. A personal favourite was an exhibition that combined my penchants for cute animals and gratuitous violence. All of this served to heighten my admiration for the people of South Korea, who have truly found strength through the greatest of adversities — and put my frustrations with the interminable traffic on the way back to Busan into perspective!
