Today I said goodbye to my second cousin, someone I had forgot existed until a few days ago when plans were made to go on a large Yosemite trip with her and 6 of her fellow exchange students. Just a cousin right? I never realized how my view on family was so provincial… all of my relatives live thousands of miles away in Korea. Family has always meant me, my brothers, and my parents. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a somewhat familiar face from my past shows up and takes a part of me with her. I never knew her before this trip, I’m told I met her once when I was in first grade, but I never knew her. How is it that a person can so suddenly become attached? It’s simple… its knowing that she was family. As odd, and perhaps silly as it sounds, this moment while I write this I know they are in cars headed back to the train station. I’m in this mood, this zone, where the profound, the cliché, the mushy, the corny, and the truth lay down their arms and the boundaries are dissolved. I actually have more family. I have somewhere out there, people part of my blood, part of my family tree, to share our name, to share our successes and histories. How bizarre to think that the close ties I have with my immediate family are somehow expanded beyond the borders of language, culture, and continents. There was something indescribably special going through me when I answered the door when they arrived, and though they could not speak English very well I asked “so which one is my cousin?” I managed to find her, shook her hand, and at that moment realized we were not alone—that although we were the only family in our line in the US, we were still not alone. I have a cousin! And during the trip all of us hiked, laughed, joked, played mafia and renamed one of the guys “psycho;” a whole bundle of fun. She wasn’t some distant person who may call my mother from time to time. She was an actual intelligent fun loving girl. It may seem that I’m romantically interested but that is entirely incorrect. It’s just so hard to accept how real it was… To have extended family who without knowing you love and have that connection with… And yet I bring all of this up to write perhaps my final blog entry for quite some time.
For a long time people have bugged me to write in my blog, but it has been difficult. I try so many times but every time I start over. The reason? The topic is difficult. I shouldn’t hold this outlook, but every time I think to write this entry, all I can think of is goodbyes. It’s a bitter sweet thing to do. It’s now official, as many of you know I will be serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints in the Colorado Denver North area, for two years. I report to the missionary training center in Provo, Utah on July 20. In those two years I will be doing what I can to spread knowledge of my faith to anyone willing to listen in hopes of sharing the joy and happiness that has saved my life, and given it far more profound meaning than I've found this world has to offer, time and time again. I do this because I am trying to learn to love people because they are people, Children of God, before I meet them. I learned to care for my cousin within a matter of three days because she was family; I know somehow I can love the family I have in the larger and more eternal scheme. And though those who have witnessed my life know I am often rash, foolish, short-tempered or stubborn, I want you to know that we only live once. Somewhere along the line a few years ago I realized, and I fight to realize time and time again, that it is so important to do what you feel is best… ignoring the difficulties associated with the sacrifices, or the stigmas tied to your ways. With time all lies will be cleared, all rumors dwindled, and the truth and goodness of life itself will prevail. And though not everything I say will necessarily make sense, I am hoping that some day you’ll feel a certain enigma in a given situation and suddenly you will realize how real, how tangible, how short, and how beautiful life really is. Expand your horizons. Learn to love life.
I am no wise sage, nor am I the best example of my faith, far from actually. But I want to try to make a difference; I want to make a change to be the change. I want to live. To do that I feel leaving on this mission is the course for me. Not only for the many people I meet during those two years, but for myself to improve, for the sake of those who will befriend me in the years following—in the words of Tim McGraw, to be “a friend that a friend would like to have.”
Directed to those I met at Cornell. You guys are a fantabulous group of people… whoa, spell check says fantabulous is a word. Anyway, you guys are great. It was amazing meeting people from the East, (and other places) and seeing the differences in our country. To those I may have afflicted, I am sorry—truly. I have many occasions that come to mind and whether or not you were offended I am unsure however, I am sorry never the less. As for those I had great times with, wow, what times they were. Whether it was three people sitting in the same room, on the same wireless hub, IMing each other like super nerds, or repelling into an abandoned hydraulics plant, climbing to the top of Baker/Olin labs (the truth is out) or even just hanging out and talking one on one in my room. These are the moments that make life full of, well, life. The more memories we have it seems the more life has meant something to us. Some time in the future I may forget the things we said, or how many ropes we used to escape through the sky hatch… or even how many times we threw up after trying someone’s cooking but there is something that stays with us besides the pictures and smells that we remember. There is love. Think for a moment about that word, I don’t use it loosely, nor do I mean romance. I mean it in the sense of the word Joy. A love for life, a love for existence and every day we wake up to face another sunrise. Is this not love? And do these moments not give rise to such emotions? And as such as I have experienced and grew love of this kind, thus do I love those it came from. Thank you my Cornellians for a wonderful first year of college. I apologize that when I return I will be a sophomore and you will all be seniors, but I have no regrets. We’ll find each other again and life will still be beautiful.
Now as for the TKD team. I felt you guys deserved a special part of this blog, mainly because many of you I will never see again. You inspire me, with your discipline, your honor, your respect for each other, and your courage. For those non-TKDers who do not think stepping into a match against some grunt from WestPoint who’s trying to kill you does not take guts… let me tell you something. It doesn’t matter who it is you’re fighting. It’s the fight itself… there is little fear of getting hurt, because you seldom feel the pain until afterwards. It is the fear of losing, the fear of being dominated, the fear of letting down your team… ok and I admit the fear of getting your body smashed. At the WestPoint tournament first semester in the duration of the first two matches I had injured an ankle, a toe, and my right wrist. In the third match I received an illegal kick to the chin and later a second illegal kick to the face. I open my eyes with a medic around me and guess who else? The team. There was blood in my mouth and everything felt cold. Team mates cheered, some got me ice, I had won the round by default but the medic told me I was no longer able to fight. My sparring team had one match left to take first place. The other team had no heavy weight, so if our middle weight won, we would take the first place trophy. If he lost, either we would surrender to second, or I would have to fight anyway. You guys on the team got me geared up, iced, checked out by the medic and stood with me as the match began. My middle weight slowly fell behind in his fight while under my breath I was praying desperately I would not have to go in again. When he lost I felt a gut feeling hit me like nothing I’d known before. I smiled, started to walk in and that’s when I grew to love you guys so much. There were so many of you Cornellians there cheering me on. If you imagine the mixed feelings I was getting standing there before the match started you’d know how emotionally disoriented I was. By the second half I was down 5 points and in my head I heard myself saying, “oh gosh, I’m going to die… I’m going to die, I’m going to die,” but somewhere amidst the sound of adrenaline flowing through my body I heard… “CORNELL FIGHT TEAM! HUAH! CORNELL FIGHT TEAM! HUAH! CORNELL FIGHT TEAM! HUAAAAAH!” Everything hurt so bad I was crying inside but in a mad frenzy thanks to you guys I kicked the crap out of the fellow and evened the score to 7-8… but then I lost by one point. Oh I felt terrible, but I saw nothing but smiles when I took off my helmet and returned to you guys. I will always remember when Evan grabbed my shoulder and said “Hey, you won that match in my eyes.” You’ll never know man how much easier that made it for me that night.
From that day on despite the nature of the sport, there was love at each practice and at each tournament. Definitely not your romantic stuff (though I heard 75% of the team was dating someone else on the team) but there was team work. There is something unique about feeling as though you are on the brink of death and then realizing who it was that brought you back. You guys trained me, drilled me, worked me, beat the heck out of me, all so we can rise, or fall together. All of my trophies I owe to upper classmen. To the seniors, and people I thought were seniors: Brian block was my inspiration to be fearless. Evan was my inspiration to be invincible. Tanya was my inspiration to be agile; Naji and Jacque to be perfect in forms, Ana to still have a heart, Jenn to be a leader, Gary, to perfect that crazy shuffle step advance attack… and although I may not have included everyone you were all excellent examples. And though he will never read this entry, I owe a lot to Master Cho who gave me the opportunity to work my heart out and still have room to improve. Special thanks to him.
Everyone else on the team, we had some awesome times suffering together. You three sophomores who I ended the year with walking the streets of Cornell, you guys are amazing. You now-sophomores have a large load to carry. Stay strong, I’ll see you soon and goodness, I’ll be taking orders from you guys! Until then, CORNELL FIGHT TEAM!
I noticed I’m writing this blog in reverse chronological order. So what’s next? Sacramento friends! There isn’t too much I need to say to you guys because we still keep in touch and see each other. But it would be terrible for me to neglect supporting the quote “show me his friend’s and I will tell you the kind of man he is.” You guys are great and I know we’ll find each other quickly upon my return (I know where you live… all of you). We’ve had bumps, and sometimes huge potholes, but all of those things make us stronger in the end. The friendships that have been tried and retried successfully are the ones to withstand depleted uranium shells in the future. We better hang out before I go though, I don’t want any regrets upon leaving. Be good to yourselves, and thanks for everything. Love you guys all.
Wow this is like a novel, but I finally got to the end of it without erasing and starting over. I guess this is what happens when you postpone writing in a blog for so long. As for contact information, I can be reached via email ak375@cornell.edu, for now as I will receive a new email address soon. I cannot however, respond via email, so send me your addresses. My mailing address from July 20 to 3 weeks later will be
Elder Alexander Jun Hyuk Kim
Colorado Denver North Mission
Provo Missionary Training Center
2005 N 900 E Provo UT 84604
Until further notice, after those three weeks my new address will be
Elder Alexander Jun Hyuk Kim
Colorado Denver North Mission
11172 N Huron Ste 21
Northglenn CO 80234
To everyone out there I want to share two passages in closing. The first is by Henry Longfellow:
“Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time;
Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.”
The last is the motto that’s come to my head whenever I run or do anything while tired.
“Infinite Strength—Infinite Energy.”
Here it is. My updated blog. If you read to the end I applaud you, and thank you. If you made it all the way through it says something. Thanks again guys, and remember
“Dying is bad for your health, so when in doubt, dance with Fruit.”
-Alexander Kim
