My grandmother was born in Inje County, Gangwon Province, in what is now South Korea. She was displaced by the division of the peninsula, ending up in the North. I vividly remember her repeatedly saying she wanted to visit Jeju Island before leaving this world. The irony is that I, her grandson, was able to visit Jeju last year but this time round as a contemporary displaced person. A defector, unable to see his own grandmother, can be in the very place she longs to see. The reality renders me pensive; the division of the peninsula is unnatural but fixed in global politics.
