24. He is the Boss

I subscribed most of the magazines and papers for the teens. There was a comic called ‘Teen 007’ in one of the papers. The comic showed unrealistic and advanced weapons and machineries. We now see and use many of them.

 

I could send poems, essays, and even short stories to these periodicals. They required the name of the school and the grade. I submitted my writings and wrote I was home schooling. They never picked mine. I submitted few in my brother’s name using his school name and grade. They picked those. They even sent him certificates and prizes to his school. That put him in an awkward situation. I stopped using his name.

 

One of the magazines had relay novel contest. Each month, they picked a story from the submissions. Next month want-to-be writers would submit sequel to the story and continue. I submitted my script and it was picked. That was the beginning of my dream of becoming a writer.

 

Pen-pal was popular. I paid a fee and joined a club, and they sent me addresses of the foreigners. I could submit my address to the magazines or pick an address from them. I exchanged letters in English with Norwegian girl.

 

Students had to take entrance exam to middle and high schools. My older sister took the exam and went to the middle school, then, went to Seoul Art High School. My brother whose grades was in the upper middle of the class did not have to take entrance exam for middle school. They changed the entrance system and introduced lottery instead of exam. There was a rumor it was for President Park’s son. It was time for him to go to middle school and they did not want him to fail the exam.

 

Father wanted my brother to be a strong boy and sent him to Tae Kwon Do. He was good at it. In middle school, he reached to black belt level 2, and even won a medal in the tournament. He had to take the entrance exam for high school. His grades were not good enough for the best schools. The middle school, Dae Sung, he went to opened the high school a year ago. Father decided to send him there.

 

That probably was one of the best decisions father made. In those days, high school students in Korea had to take military training. A few days each month, they went to school in camouflage military uniforms. Boys trained with wooden rifles, and girls trained with medical bags. My brother became the leader of the school students’ guidance. They helped the school faculties maintain and enforce the rules and safety. Later, he became the commander of student military company. While he was the leader of the school students’ guidance, he got rid of bad kids in the neighborhood and the local merchants praised him.

 

His leadership continued since then. He has been running his own company for over 20 years and he is well known in Southern California Korean community. After the college, he got a job with Korean bank and quickly became the branch president. Then, he left the bank, got some investor, and formed a finance company.

 

Kids who excel in school seldom become the boss. They can easily get good paying jobs with bright future. They would advance without taking any risks. But well-established good companies have limitation. There are turns and orders. As they go up, they would face the bottle neck.

 

Those who were in the lower middle of the class need breaks. All the good positions are already taken by the kids with good grades. They have to take a risk. If they survived the risk, the whole situation would reverse. Now, they can hire those who did well in school working for them.

 

The latter has good social skills and would not mind the risks. I belong to the former, and my brother is the latter.

 

Once I retired from the state government, I have been working for my brother. I know more about the work and do it better than him. But he is the boss and I work for him.