Roughing It

A trip with no open arms waiting at your destination and no consequences whether you get there or not. They agreed not to spend any money on this “hobo’s journey” but decided to set out from the station, where everyone starts a vacation. The first event on their journey was the weather: fat drops of rain began to fall the moment they met, so they wouldn’t be congratulating themselves on choosing a wonderful day for a hike. Manjae, Bongsu, Yŏngdŏk—the three met in front of Kŭmch’ŏn Station Historical Entrance and formed a triangle as they stood staring out at the rain falling on the plaza.

Since Manjae had taken a high-speed train from Seoul, it might seem like their hobo trip was compromised from the start, but the tickets hadn’t cost him any money. Back in tenth grade, he’d gone to an elementary school class reunion and met an old classmate called Kijŏng who was attending a rail workers’ vocational high school. Manjae never paid for another train ticket again. While his friend Kijŏng was studying to be a rail worker, Manjae got to pass right through the turnstile, and after his friend graduated, Manjae’s free rides were a little more official, thanks to Kijŏng’s rail worker ID.

When Bongsu first suggested the trip, he didn’t say anything about traveling like hobos. Once they’d decided on the trip, however, Manjae relayed Yŏngdŏk’s comment that it might be fun to go on a trip that didn’t cost any money—like in the old days—and all Bongsu said was that he’d been thinking of not going anyway because it would be a waste of money. Bongsu thought he’d ride to the station on his uncle’s antique moped—as he usually did—but the uncle had taken the old bike out the day before and hadn’t yet returned. His grandmother told him over the phone that the thing had completely broken down. His uncle had abandoned it on the banks of the Naktong River about five li away and was walking back home. So Yŏngdŏk got out his bicycle, thinking that they could ride to the station together with Bongsu on the back.

Yŏngdŏk strapped his backpack in reverse across his chest, and Bongsu wore his the normal way on his back, like a turtle shell, so that one could use the seat and the other could perch on the rear rack. But the old bicycle—which had been ridden by Yŏngdŏk’s father, a teacher, to and from school every day for the past thirty years and that had retired along with the old man—wasn’t up to the task of carrying two twenty-year-olds stuffed full of food like hibernating bears who didn’t know how long they might have to starve themselves on this hobo journey, plus their backpacks filled to double capacity with provisions. When they climbed on, the back tire groaned and sighed—just like Yŏngdŏk’s father when he sat down to breakfast the morning of his retirement party—all the air went out with a hiss and a whoosh. Yŏngdŏk ignored this and stepped on the pedal, which resulted in a loud pop from the front tire as it gave out. In the end, they could only balance their packs on the bike and walk it all the way to the station, but even that little bit of help from the bicycle helped them get to Kŭmch’ŏn Station a few minutes early to meet Manjae just as he was getting off the train.

Bongsu grabbed Manjae’s backpack first thing and started rummaging through it to make sure he’d brought all the equipment, as promised. The tent, in its own bag, had been purchased with Kijŏng’s very first paycheck as a railworker and was the most important item since their hobo’s journey would be all [End Page 70...