Gone were the days when students could breeze through college—no one simply gave up on their GPA and partied for four years anymore. Most people kept their grades up, studied English, did internships, entered competitions, and worked part time. Jiyoung complained to Eunyoung that there was no romance in college life anymore, to which she replied, “You’re out of your mind.”
Many of Jiyoung’s college friends told similar stories of their fathers’ businesses folding or of them being laid off during the recent financial crisis. While the economy remained bad and college students got by with part-time work and help from parents whose job security still hung in the balance, college tuition fees (frozen during the financial crisis) climbed as if to make up for lost time. In the 2000s, the cost of college tuition increased by over twice the consumer inflation rate.8
The first close friend Jiyoung made in college went on leave of absence after her freshman year. She was from a town three hours outside Seoul by express bus. She said she’d worked tirelessly to get away from her parents and go to college in Seoul. She didn’t say as much, but it seemed she received little to no financial support from her parents. She said she could work all the part-time jobs she could find and still not make enough to cover tuition, rent, and expenses.
“I teach at the college essay cram school in the afternoon, and waitress at the café at night. I come home, shower, and it’s already two in the morning. That’s when I prep for class or grade papers before getting a few hours’ sleep. As you know, I’m on the work study program when I don’t have classes during the day. I’m honestly so tired I keep falling asleep in class. Trying to afford college is ruining my college life. My GPA is in the toilet, too.”
The plan was to move back home and save money for just one year. Jiyoung lent her an attentive ear knowing nothing could be of comfort or encouragement to her friend besides money. A little over 160 centimeters tall, her friend had lost 12 kilos since starting college, and now weighed just over forty. “They were right about dropping weight in college!” she cried and laughed her head off as if it was the funniest thing in the world. The elastic around the sleeves of her gray jacket was stretched out, and her bony wrists showed underneath.
Jiyoung’s college life was very comfortable by comparison—living under her parents’ roof, no student loans, and just four hours per week of tutoring work her mother secured for her. Her grades were not good but she found her major interesting, and dipped into a wide range of college academic conferences and joined clubs that would not help her get a job because she didn’t have a clear picture of what she wanted to do after college. There were no rewards as instant as pressing a button on a vending machine for snacks, but the activities didn’t turn out to be a complete waste of time. Jiyoung discovered that she wasn’t as introverted as she’d thought she was when she didn’t have the opportunity to think, or form and express opinions. In fact, she turned out to be surprisingly friendly, sociable, and fond of being in the spotlight. And she met her first boyfriend at the college hiking club.
He was a physical education major, the same age as Jiyoung. The senior members always paired them together on hikes to help Jiyoung keep up with the group. The boyfriend took her to her first baseball game and soccer match. She didn’t understand what was going on all of the time, but the atmosphere in the stadium and her affection for her boyfriend made these sporting events fun. Before the start, he pointed out the major players and important rules of the game for Jiyoung, who knew zilch about sports, and, while the game was in play, they focused on the action. Jiyoung asked him why he didn’t explain to her what was going on during the game.
“It’s like, you don’t explain to me every line and every scene when we see a movie together. Guys who keep explaining things to their girlfriends during the game are, I dunno, kind of full of themselves. Are they here to see the game, or to show off? Anyway, it’s uncool.”
The couple frequented the free film screenings hosted by the college film club, and it was always Jiyoung who chose what to see. He enjoyed all genres—horror, romance, period, sci-fi. He laughed harder and cried harder than Jiyoung did. He got jealous when she mentioned that actor so-and-so was handsome, and made her a CD of all her favorite movie soundtracks.
They usually hung out on campus. They studied together in the library, wrote papers together in the computer lab, and chilled out together in the bleachers in the athletics field. They ate in the student dining hall, snacked in the new convenience store that opened in the student center, and had coffee in the café next to it. On special days, they would go to a high-end Japanese place or a restaurant out of the average student’s price range. He enjoyed listening to Jiyoung retell the plot of a comic-book series she read when she was little, or a novel or popular TV show, and nagged at her to take up exercise—skip rope, whatever.
Jiyoung’s mother received information that the new building across the street from their former fried chicken bar was to house a pediatric hospital with wards. She talked her husband—who’d sworn he’d never become an indentured slave of a franchise again—into opening a franchise porridge shop, and a pediatric hospital really did move in across the street and take up floors two to eight. The hospital food was fortunately not very tasty, sending many parents to the porridge shop for takeaways, and families stopped by for a meal on the way to and from the hospital. The apartment complex going up in the area was completed and filled with plenty of young parents who frequently dined out. Even on weekdays, the shop had families drop in for dinner, and families with small children became regulars for lack of other suitable options in the area. The family income was beyond compare to what Jiyoung’s father made at the government job.
The family later found out that Jiyoung’s mother had purchased a large flat in the massive apartment complex nearby. She’d been paying off the mortgage for years, and, thanks to the porridge business running smoothly, she sold the smaller place they were living in and paid off the last of the mortgage. The family—including Eunyoung, who finished her degree at the teacher training college down south, decided she’d prefer to work in Seoul, and passed the state teacher exam for a position in Seoul—moved into the brand-new apartment.
Jiyoung’s father returned home happy after a long night of drinking with his former colleagues in the civil service, and called his children’s names so loudly that the living room shook. The youngest, who was listening to music with his earbuds in and didn’t hear him come in, and the two sisters who were asleep came out to greet him, and the father opened his wallet and put cards and cash in their hands. The mother appeared, yawning, and chided him for waking everyone up by coming home uncharacteristically drunk and boisterous.
“My life turned out the best! Those guys at the gathering today can’t hold a candle to this! I’ve made it! Good job, everybody! We’ve done well!”
As it turned out, the colleague who invested in the Chinese trade blew his severance. The rest were all making a pittance, the ones who stuck with the government job as well as those who retired and opened businesses like he did. He had the largest income and house. Everyone was jealous of his three children, his eldest a teacher, his second attending university in Seoul, and his youngest, a son. As Father stood tall and glowed with pride, Mother linked arms with him and laughed.