[March phase I - departure] Danwon students trek to honor their lost friends

Posted on : 2014-07-17 12:03 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
47km march will bring them to the National Assembly, where they’ll join parents calling for special Sewol law
 Gyeonggi Province at the start of their march to the National Assembly
Gyeonggi Province at the start of their march to the National Assembly

By Kim Kyu-nam and Heo Seung, staff reporters

Sporting short-sleeved school uniform shirts and athletic shorts, the Danwon High School students walked along the road in groups of twos and threes. The lingering midday heat that sizzled off of the asphalt was stifling, and the students busily fanned themselves and each other to try to keep cool. There were occasional bursts of laughter and chatter, but their steps remained calm and measured.

When asked why he and other Danwon students were undertaking this two-day march starting on the afternoon of July 15 to the National Assembly in Yeouido, Seoul, a second-year Danwon student surnamed Park answered, “We want to know why our friends had to die. We are marching in support of the Danwon parents who are on a hunger strike in front of the National Assembly.” Another student refused to sit out this 47km midsummer march, despite the bulky cast he sported on his right leg due to a ligament injury he sustained prior to the Sewol tragedy. “I want to march to honor my friends who cannot be with us today,” he said. A friend walking alongside him poked fun at his injury, saying, “He got hurt fighting with someone who provoked him on the street while he was walking with his girlfriend.”

Second year Danwon High School students who survived the Sewol tragedy
Second year Danwon High School students who survived the Sewol tragedy

38 second-year Danwon students, who lost both fellow classmates and teachers in the Apr. 16 Sewol tragedy, left their school at 5 pm. Another 20 parents, teachers, and volunteers joined them on their journey. Before the march began, a student surnamed Shin read from a letter he had written. “The whole country saw what happened on April 16. We hope that the truth behind the accident that my friends unfairly died in will be revealed at last. We don’t know much about law. But we are marching today because we felt we had to do something.”

The students had yellow handkerchiefs around their necks commemorating their friends’ and teachers’ deaths, and from each of their backpacks protruded a yellow flag symbolic of their sorrow. On the flags, they had written messages like “I miss you, Lee [name redacted],” “Please watch over our march,” “We wish we could do more for you,” and “May small efforts make big miracles.”

 on the afternoon of July 15. (by Lee Jeong-yong
on the afternoon of July 15. (by Lee Jeong-yong

One skinny student limped along as if his leg hurt, but refused to stop walking. “It’s hard,” he admitted, “But we started this knowing it would be hard.” He said he was walking in memory of his friends. Then he started choking up. “No one in a position of power is doing anything about the tragedy.”

One Danwon father, 57, who came on the march to support his son, said, “They’re still kids, and it’s easier for them to deal with their sorrow when they’re with their friends. When they’re alone, it’s really tough. So we came together to share our pain.”

“We are praying for the Sewol victims,” said one banner along the road. Citizens along the road lightly clapped or said words of encouragement whenever they saw Danwon High School students walk by, and cars slowed down when they passed by the group. Ansan resident Jang Hwa-sook, 35, who learned of the march on Facebook, walked with the students for over an hour. “What they are doing touches my heart,” she said.

 staff photographer)
staff photographer)

A 48-year-old man surnamed Ahn also cheered the students on. “You have to realize that because of the Sewol tragedy, about 90 students who used to bike to school every morning in our neighborhood cannot do so anymore. It tore my heart apart to see a girl marching with six or seven nametags of friends she lost in the Sewol incident tacked onto her backpack. I want to support these kids,” said Ahn.

Danwon parents call this march a ‘path to closure.’ “As witnesses and victims of the Sewol tragedy, our children want to know the truth. We believe that the physical act of walking itself will serve as a form of healing therapy,” they said.

Before the march, the students visited the graves of 103 of their friends at Ansan Public Cemetery at 6:50 pm. After eating a dinner prepared for them by local residents, they armed themselves with red lights and continued to make their way towards Seoul in the dark. They marched unperturbed through the rain showers that came around 8:40 pm, and spent the night at Seoul Young Workers’ Welfare Center in Gwangmyeong, Gyeonggi Province.

The students are going to walk the remaining 16 km to the National Assembly in the morning of July 16. There, they would be met with the sight of Danwon parents on a hunger strike to press for the speedy enactment of the Sewol special law.

 

Translated by Noh Ga-ram, Hankyoreh English intern

 

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]

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