Hwang Sok-Yong - The Guest

That afternoon, the group of Homeland Visitors boarded the tour bus that would drive them around downtown Pyongyang and stop at several historical sites. Yosŏp ended up sitting by the professor, who had claimed the seat with the best view, the one directly behind the driver. The professor was already waiting and saving a seat for him by the time Yosŏp climbed aboard. So, what sights did Yosŏp see? He began by reading the strange signs and billboards, muttering to himself the way he did in any new city when he spotted something written in English, Japanese, or German. It was his way of trying to reconcile himself to his alien surroundings, to avoid a sense of disharmony

Industrial Products Store, Agricultural Products Store, Fish Market, Vegetable Store, Butcher Shop, Dog Meat Shop, Noodle Shop, Rice Cake Shop, Ice Cream and Soda Shop, Barbershop, Beauty Parlor, Bathhouse, Bakery, Home Appliance Repair Shop, Clothing Store, Tailor Shop, Rice Soup Restaurant, Bookstore. Then there were all the propagandistic slogans spelled out with crude neon letters in primary red and blue, as yet unlit. Live Life Our Way! Mobilize, Annihilate, Expedite! Beautify Pyongyang, Capital of the Revolution! Long Live Our Great Leader, Comrade Kim Il Sung! The Party Decides, We Act! Revolution and Construction, Anti-Japanese Guerrilla Style!

The bus coasted through the sparsely peopled streets at a leisurely pace. Every now and then it would stop in front of the Arch of Triumph, the Tower of Self-reliance, the People’s Palace of Culture, or the Pyongyang Department Store. The Homeland Visitors, listening to their guides and lecturers, were forced into single file and stood in vacant admiration before these impressive buildings and monuments, these heaps of marble, cement, and tile.

Reverend Ryu much preferred to simply sit by the window and watch the passersby. An old grandmother walked by carrying a bag and in a great hurry to get who-knows-where; young people in twos and threes crossed the street chattering back and forth; groups of students marched by all lined up with a gait that spoke of having places to be and things to do. It was a weekday, and most people wore working clothes, their collars buttoned up at the neck. Every now and then a man in a suit would come into view. High school and junior high school students’ uniforms were the color of persimmons, complete with hats that resembled Lenin caps. The elementary students walked by in orderly lines wearing jumpers, overly colorful shirts with huge red ribbons, or red Boy Scout kerchiefs tied around their necks. The women all wore fairly similar two-piece outfits — the only noticeable difference between old and young was that the younger women’s dresses were slightly brighter and their heels slightly higher. Every now and then you might spot a young woman with a stylish hairdo wearing a short skirt or a Western-style dress and holding a parasol, but then there were also some women still in their work clothes, wearing sports caps with long visors. Weighed down with sacks of green onions and vegetables, they were probably on their way home from the grocery store. A housewife, carrying one child on her back and holding another by the hand, hurried towards a streetcar stop.

The streetcars were shaped like buses, complete with rubber tires, and were connected to a system of electric wires that hung suspended in the air. They passed by every now and then. Each streetcar was made up of two compartments connected together by something like an oversized accordion. Citizens were lined up at every stop. A truck sped by carrying men and women in work clothes, not one of them standing or sitting, all just squatting there in neat rows, staring straight ahead. A young female traffic officer whizzed by on a streetcar, brandishing her baton. For one fleeting instant, her green uniform and the white face underneath her cap were frozen in the windowpane. She disappeared.

The city was like a cinema screen; a flat square of life lay out there. Watching it made Yosŏp himself feel as if he were no longer quite three-dimensional. The multitude of people who had created this movie for themselves had singled out Ryu Yosŏp, and they had no intention of ever letting him in, no matter how desperately he tried to climb into the screen.

That night Yosŏp went with the group to the Kyoye Theater, where they watched a performance that involved all kinds of acrobatics, not to mention somersaults and seesaws, tightropes, balls, horses, and even magic tricks — and yet he remained decidedly unexcited. The buildings, the monuments, the milky light of the streetlamps and all those passersby — they were still all too vivid. He felt as if he had walked into some sort of surrealistic painting.

A cylindrical aquarium slowly rose up over the round stage, followed by a translucent veil of artificial fog. Inside the cylinder were a number of dancers clad in bathing suits; their undulating movements made the red, white, and blue sashes tied around their waists billow out like fish fins. With the colorful lighting that was projected on them from above, the dancers appeared to be fluttering in midair. As the lights were gradually dimmed and the fog floated further upward, the dancers, too, slowly ascended. Right as they were about to disappear completely behind the curtains that hung above the stage, the lights all went out at once. Immediately, the room was filled with thunderous applause. Then, in that very instant, the hazy figure of a man rose from that darkness. By and by, the figure became distinct, its mouth spreading sideways into a grin. What on earth. who is that? Is that the Mole? Uncle Sunnam? The moment passed and Yosŏp found that he wasn’t even that startled. Doubtless he had simply imagined it.

When Yosŏp, fumbling in the darkness, came out of the aisle between the seats, the female volunteer who’d been standing at the rear of the theater approached him.

“Where are you going, sir?”

“Ah, I. don’t feel too good.”

The attendant led him to an emergency exit at the left corner of the theater and cracked it open.

“There’s an infirmary that way, at the end of the corridor. When you return, come in through this door,” she whispered.

Out in the corridor, Yosŏp loitered aimlessly for a while before turning in the opposite direction, away from the hall with the bathroom. He ended up in the theater’s spacious lobby. The room was completely empty: nothing but unoccupied sofas and mirrored pillars. He couldn’t quite tell which pillar it was, but someone emerged from behind one of them and weaving his way in and out between the other pillars, cast a quick glance back in Yosŏp’s direction. Without realizing what he was doing, Yosŏp followed the shadow’s trail. Passing the mirrors, Yosŏp ran into countless reflections of his own torso, stopping him in his tracks over and over again.

Pushing through the big glass doors at the front of the theater I walked out onto the street; a cool breeze enveloped me for a moment before it moved on. I began to stumble down the slope of the cement sidewalk. In the darkness, someone approached me.

Where are you going? Come with me.

I turned and saw the white figure of Uncle Sunnam, looking the same as he had so long ago, the year he returned to his hometown. He’d been in his early forties then, and he always wore the people’s uniform with all the buttons and his hair cut short. He was younger than me now, it seemed, but despite my seniority I couldn’t help but feel like a child.

How come you keep showing up by yourself? What happened to Big Brother?

I came to see you ’cause Yohan asked me to. There’s something I want to show you.

He led me past an apartment complex speckled here and there with lit windows and took me out to the riverbank. I went over to sit on a wooden bench underneath the thick willow trees that lined the bank. I could feel Sunnam standing right behind me.