Insadong is very special place in Seoul.
Many of tourists are coming over Insadong for enjoying Korean traditional culture and shopping.
There are lots of restaurants and traditional caffe selling Korean traditional teas.
Up until several years ago, lots of antique shops were selling the curios.
But nowdays, it is not easy to buy the antiques here.
Insadong was changing rapidly for the tourism.
So like other many places, we could not look at real Korean culture in Insadong.
About 20 years ago, I had dropped by a caffe, the name of ‘Gui Cheon’, the meaning of GUI Cheon is ‘Comming Back to the Heaven’
The name of that caffe was the title of very famous poem in Korea.
This caffe had been managed by a poet’s wife.
It is over my ability to translate this poem in English.
But the subject of this poem was that the poet came here on the earth in picnic, so he would like to get back to the heaven, and he’d like to tell that the things on the earth was beautiful.
Actually I was shedding my tears when I read this poem.
Because we, Koreans, know how he had lived in Korea.
He was very genius when he was student. But he decided to be a poet and gave up the value of secular. He refused some very good suggestions for living.
But under the military coup government, he was arrested and tortured seriously.
He was abandoned by the street.
Many people thought he must’ve died, so they issued the posthumous manuscript.
So he became a first poet who had the posthumous publication while he was alive.
His life was deteriorated by the torture, they destroyed not only his body but also his spirit.
He could not live without someone’s help.
So one of his friend suggested his younger sister to marry him and care for him.
It would be nonsense, but his sister noticed his genius at first glance and deeply impressed by his angel like soul.
They loved each other deeply, it was a love of Logos.
They married, but it was hard to live without the income. So some of his friend gathered money and bought small caffe for their living.
The caffe I dropped by had that story.
Now poet was passed away, and his wife was also passed away.
As a result of the torture, poet lost every thing for male, they could not have a kid.
Whenever I have walked around Insadong, I visit the caffe ‘Gui Cheon’
I miss him and her.
They had stayed on the earth like the pure angels
Here I ‘d like to introduce the photo of the caffe ‘Gui Cheon’
Outside of caffe
Inside of the caffe.
On the wall, poet and his wife
The Korean traditional tea and the snack
Cheon Sang Byeong was poet, and Mok Soon Ok was her name.