#2

"I thought, on the train, how utterly we have forsaken the Earth, in the sense of excluding it from our thoughts. There are but few who consider its physical hugeness, its rough enormity. It is still a disparate monstrosity, full of solitudes & barrens & wilds. It still dwarfs & terrifies & crushes. The rivers still roar, the mountains still crash, the winds still shatter. Man is an affair of cities. His gardens & orchards & fields are mere scrapings. Somehow, however, he has managed to shut out the face of the giant from his windows. But the giant is there, nevertheless."

Holly Stevens, "Souvenirs and Prophecies"

"World's most dangerous creature"

#1

"The journal, which he was keeping at the time of his death in 1982, began with an apology. 'With a mixed feeling of fear and excitement, I am afraid that hardly knowing how to spell, I may become a laughingstock for writing this storyƒ.On my second birthday my father passed away. Soon after, I suffered a disease that almost killed meƒ. My mother, Yang Sun Nyo, was a woman of great misfortune; she married four timesƒ. Leaving me in her sister's care in Seoul when I was only an infant, she took all sorts of jobs, including a housemaid, but without much success. Come to think of it, she was only 25. No one can blame her for trying to seek happiness by remarrying. My childhood dream was having a bowl of hot rice."

"Remembering Duk Koo Kim,"