WeTried Translations

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◈ The Hunting Genius of the Japanese Colonial Era

Chapter 13

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The Heaven-Dancing Laborer[1]

"Here, take it. The five won I promised."

Hajama Tsuchimaru pulled out five paper bills.

When the money appeared, the laborers swallowed hard. In a world where a Korean day laborer earned sixty jeon a shift, and a man who really knew construction work might or might not pull in a single won, that was a fortune, the kind you'd have to swing a pickaxe a whole week to earn.

But Han San didn't take the money.

"Um, gisu-nim[2]."

"This is no mere five won. It is the fruit of the blood and sweat you wrung out... hm? Why are you calling me? Don't tell me it isn't enough?"

Hajama's eyes narrowed. Before some line could come out about how, if it weren't enough, that would be no simple shortage but rather something or other, Han San cut in quickly.

"Ah, not enough? It's more than I deserve. That's not it, it's, um..."

Han San gestured with his chin at a pile of materials stacked in one corner of the worksite.

"Could I maybe take some of those things over there instead of the money?"

For a moment, silence fell.

The foreman's eyes went round.

"What? Things? What things? Surely you're not asking for that ox cart."

"How could I dare say something that would bring heaven's wrath down on me? Just that one sack of cement over there, and that one bundle of thick wire. Give me only that, and I'd take it gratefully."

Those two were the things Han San had set his eye on the moment he arrived at the worksite.

'One sack of cement and I can rough-coat the weak spots in our walls. That blocks the side drafts, and it would do a little for next year's flood too. And that steel wire — the uses are endless. I can make tools, I can make traps...'

Han San swallowed his secret eagerness and bowed his head. The foreman was relieved it wasn't the ox, but then he frowned, puzzled.

"No, wouldn't it be better to take the money and buy your own in town? Five won, that's the price of a whole barrel, not just one sack of cement, and you won't take it!"

"That's exactly the problem."

Han San explained with a deliberately troubled face.

"A sack of cement, or shiny steel banseon wire — you think a fellow like me would get sold any of it? They'd just hand over old, rusted stuff.

And even if some kind soul did sell to me, hauling it from town all the way out here, up over the mountains... ugh. Sturdy as my shoulders are, they'd be wrecked. Wrecked."

This wasn't Han San laying it on thick.

A sack of cement was fifty kilograms. The wire was five, so the two together came to fifty-five. Add the twenty-two and a half already loaded on his A-frame carrier and it was seventy-seven and a half.

Forty kilograms was about the limit for climbing mountains with any ease, and he'd already blown past that, pushing close to the eighty that was the absolute ceiling for what a man could carry and still move.

Bring it back with no ox cart and no donkey, and even Han San would spend the whole next day flat on his back, aching.

"Rather than that, I happened to be out in town today, and on my way home it was right there in front of me... I live near here, you see. What a stroke of luck, running into you fine gentlemen."

Listening, the foreman's eyes changed too. He clicked away at an abacus inside his head.

'Call a sack of cement two won, a bundle of wire roughly two won too. Cost-wise it's only about four won.'

On top of that, worksite materials were always logged with plenty to spare, weren't they? Perfectly good materials suddenly going [lost] or [damaged] was one of those incurable traditional games the rascals at any worksite loved to play.

If one of those merry little ledger pranks unfolded this time too, it would amount to handling the whole thing for free, and then that floating five won would...

But it was right there in his thinking that the foreman caught himself. He wasn't the one who made decisions here.

"Hmm."

Hajama the surveyor crossed his arms.

"Interesting. I took you for a man who only climbed mountains well, but your arithmetic is sharp too."

"Ah, of course, if I've said something out of line..."

"I'll allow it."

Hajama nodded, surprisingly cheerful about it. The foreman let out a breath of relief and waved at the laborers.

"You lot! Don't just stand there, load the cement and the wire onto his carrier!"

The laborers moved at once. Han San caught his breath and watched.

That was when Hajama drew a business card from his coat and held it out.

"Take this."

"Sorry?"

"This is no mere business card. It is a signal that we, the Hajama family, hold you in regard."

Han San took the card without quite meaning to.

"The Hajama... family?"

"We make our living by surveying.

My elder brother, my elder sister, my younger siblings — all of them are surveyors. My nephew is a reporter, but he too has a talent for surveying. Our clan does business with the land we survey.

In particular, there's a man in Busan called Hajama Fusataro. He's my uncle, and he runs a very large operation — farms, modernizing houses, all of it."

"Ah."

All at once, his memory lit up.

[Hyung. I had someone buy a villa for me down in Dongnae. The Hajama villa, they call it. I plan to use it as a ryotei[3].]

[From what Tono-ssi tells me, this Fusataro was hounded something fierce by his tenant farmers. The people of this country have no reason in them, do they? They think throwing a fit gets them everything. Such pitiful people, really.]

[Maybe that's why it happened? During the renovation work, in the mulberry field behind the villa, hyung, I found a secret underground storeroom... and you know what was inside?]

That harmless little smile behind the glasses, the voice of 'Teacher Han Bada,' rang and hummed in his ears.

[Dynamite.]

[The place was packed full of dynamite.]

[What on earth did he gather all that dynamite for? And then why did he die without using a single stick? Or was it that he chose not to use it... You know, hyung... every time I think about things like this... I feel more and more like I love this world.]

Han San steadied his breathing.

It took him a fair while to shake off the feeling.

He focused on the information.

'The Hajama villa in Dongnae. The secret storehouse in the mulberry field. Dynamite.'

Was it already there?

Even if it was, it was a picture of a rice cake, nothing he could touch. He could barely handle the one rifle at home, groaning under that — so what would he do with explosives?

And Dongnae, of all places. That was a thousand li[4] from here, wasn't it.

'Still... let me remember it. Live long enough and there are days you'd be glad of even dog dung.'

Better if it never came to that. With a complicated look on his face, Han San filed the thought away.

As it happened, Hajama Tsuchimaru was just finishing his long, long boast about his clan.

"...In short, this peninsula is no longer simply land. It is a record, inscribed by the pen that is our clan."

"Yes, well..."

"And the reason I've talked at such length is... how about it — would you consider working under me as an assistant?"

"Sorry?"

That one caught even Han San off guard.

Hajama fiddled with the round glasses perched on the bridge of his nose as he spoke.

"The pay won't disappoint you. What do you say? Don't you want to roam the peninsula alongside me, as my own man? Do well, and, as I said, our whole clan does similar work. I could send you to a post in Gyeongseong or Busan."

Han San realized his skill at climbing mountains had whetted the surveyor's appetite.

But after a moment's thought, Han San bowed his head.

"I'm grateful for the offer, but... I'm just more comfortable up in the mountains, digging herbs and the like."

Honestly it wasn't a bad offer, but the reason he couldn't take it was clear.

A surveyor in this era was not simply a — well, putting it that way makes a man sound like Hajama, so never mind, but in any case, they weren't the kind of civilians you'd see later, a professor on a research team or a hired expert.

Most surveyors were civil servants attached to the Government-General's Forestry Office[5], the era's forestry service.

It wasn't purely out of resentment toward the Government-General. Become an assistant tied to a civil servant who was himself already bound to the state? End up in a position where, if one day they suddenly told you to go off to Naju or Daegu, you had to leave that very day? How could anyone accept that?

Han San had a family to look after!

At the very least, until next year's great flood, he had to keep his backside firmly planted around here.

"I have parents at home who are unwell... and my younger brother is still little..."

"Mm. Then forget the Gyeongseong or Busan posts — just travel around with me? I'll be in this area for quite a while."

Hajama looked reluctant to let it go. Recognizing that his mountain-climbing form had flaunted far too lethal a charm, Han San dialed up the strength of his refusal.

"Gisu-nim, I'm truly grateful for your offer, but, that... if I'm honest, surveying work is, how do I put it, a little frightening..."

At the sight of Han San scratching the back of his head and smiling so guilelessly, Hajama tilted his head.

"Frightening?"

"They say when you do surveying you drive iron stakes into the mountain's flank and all that. Something about the mountain spirit growing angry, the vital energy flowing through the ridgeline being severed[6], and so on. There's an old shaman granny up in our village's Upper Hamlet, and she put such a fright in me..."

When he loosely mixed in a story he'd read in a magazine late in his past life, Hajama's eyes scrunched up tight.

"What we drive in are just plain iron pins for surveying."

"Yes, well..."

"Honestly, Koreans can't develop because of that wretched geomancy. As it is, every time I go somewhere to survey I clash with those geomancers, and my nephew suffered terribly with it too."

"Yes, well..."

"Geomancy. It is no longer simply superstition. It is a curse that locks Koreans inside the pre-modern."

"Yes, well..."

Han San found one more reason he couldn't work under this Hajama fellow. Listen to that peculiar way of talking long enough and he might throw the man to the wolves without even realizing it.

But just then, Hajama Tsuchimaru the surveyor let out a deep sigh.

And looking at Han San with careful eyes, he said,

"They really are just simple stakes for surveying. Keeping tradition is fine, but don't let it jerk you around. If a young man with skills like yours gets the wrong idea, the loss isn't mine for failing to hire you — it's a loss to your own life. You're young. That's a truly precious thing."

Han San raised an eyebrow slightly. From the way Hajama looked, he felt a certain goodwill, the kind an older man offers a young one.

Of course, Han San's real age was seventy-four, and precisely because of that he tucked away, for now, the retort that ran something like [did you think people would roll out a welcome for those who came to measure another country's land]. It was not a matter that touched his family.

Goodwill or ill will, Han San had lived long enough to know that in the end both were bound by the limits of the individual.

"I'm truly grateful for the offer. Being your exclusive man may be too much, but if I ever happen on a chance like today again to help you out, I will."

"Mm."

Hajama nodded. He stepped back, as if he wouldn't pester him further.

Han San tucked Hajama's card into his coat. Even if he never made contact, a Japanese civil servant's business card in this era could serve as a kind of charm.

That was when the foreman came over.

"Hey there, young man. If surveying work scares you, how about just working under us? Ninety jeon a day — no, for a fellow like you I'll make it a special one won! Eh? Go to Inje town and give them the name [Yoshihiro] — I've got a bit of standing on that side. They'll wave you right through."

At that the laborers jeered.

"Hey now, foreman! You pay us sixty jeon, eighty jeon and all that crap, this is too much!"

"Climbing cliffs doesn't mean he's good at hauling! Different muscles get used, foreman, really!"

"You there, the quiet one with idle hands, go put up more tent! The sun's almost down, what are you standing around for?"

The foreman roared, scattering the laborers, then turned back to Han San with hopeful eyes.

Han San, of course, had no intention of shoveling dirt all day for money he could earn by picking up two snakes, but he didn't say so to his face. He just declined awkwardly.

"I'm sorry, foreman. Like I said before, there really is nobody but me to care for my parents..."

"Aigo, a devoted son. Tsk tsk. All right, fine."

The foreman dimly sensed that Han San was only turning him down with kind words to save his face. He warmed even more to the young man before him, but for that very reason he withdrew with a look that dripped regret.

In the meantime the laborers had brought over Han San's A-frame carrier. But the carrier had changed somewhat.

"Oh, oh, hyung-nim. This is..."

The carrier, which had just been woven from vines, was now bound tight with rope. Not only that, a few precious lengths of rebar had been fitted along the points that bore the weight.

"Ah, this? Your carrier looked too flimsy."

"Heh, young man, you're a greedy one, aren't you. How were you going to move a cement sack with that thing? So we touched it up, while we were loading it anyway."

If the old carrier could just barely hold eighty kilograms, this one looked like it could shoulder a hundred and twenty with ease. Whether you could actually carry that much and still move was another matter, of course, but it beat not being able to load it at all by a hundred, a thousand times over.

"...Thank you."

The laborers only chuckled at Han San as he dipped his head in a deep bow.

"Thank you for what. With iron bars driven in, the carrier's only gotten heavier, you know."

"That's right, that's right. We just did it out of spite, to make the young fellow suffer more."

"Truly, thank you."

"Ah, enough already! You're embarrassing us!"

"Mind yourself going. Even a monkey falls from a tree, you know. Take a tumble walking with that cement loaded and it's straight to the underworld — the underworld!"

Han San grinned.

He'd thought everyone working the new road construction was nothing but troublemaking layabouts who'd rolled in like Go Tae-chon, but maybe, even at his age, he'd carried some heavy prejudice himself.

'Then again, the Lower Hamlet fellows weren't all bad either. Go Tae-chon, Kim Tae-yang... mm, no, are they all bad after all?'

He composed his feelings and stood before the carrier.

He drew one big, deep breath and slung the carrier straps over both shoulders.

'Hup!'

He lowered his hips. He braced his core, set his center firmly, and rose using his backside.

Crrk.

A grinding sound slipped from between his teeth, but Han San's knees straightened.

"Heave-ho!"

The load of a full-grown, strapping man bore down on his whole body.

But Han San didn't stagger. The knack of seventy-four years lived alongside the mountains was carved into every joint — the technique of spreading the bound weight not only across his shoulders but through his back muscles, his glutes, and his thighs.

"I'll be off, then! Good work, all of you!"

As Han San strode away, the Leghorn tied to the very top of the carrier let out a mournful "Cluck-cluck!"

At his receding back, the laborers burst into hearty laughter.

"Ha, look at that. I take back what I said earlier! Not just mountain-climbing muscles, his working muscles are the real thing too."

"Look, he isn't even staggering. A born ox, an ox."

The foreman sighed, his face full of lingering regret.

"A fellow like that ought to be working construction..."

[1] The Korean title, 천무노가다지체, is a mock-grandiose coinage — 천무 (天舞, "heavenly dance") + 노가다 (slang for construction grunt-work, from the Japanese dokata) + 지체 (肢體, "the body/frame") — styling Han San's cliff-climbing feat like the name of a legendary martial-arts technique.

[2] Gisu (기수, 技手) was a junior technical-officer rank; here, a government surveyor.

[3] A ryotei (요정) is a Japanese-style fine-dining house, often a venue for entertainment and discreet dealings.

[4] The li (리, 里) is a traditional unit of distance, roughly 0.4 km; "a thousand li" is an idiom for "a very long way off."

[5] The Forestry Office (영림서) was the Government-General's forest-administration bureau, which employed surveyors to map and exploit the colony's woodlands.

[6] Pungsu (풍수), Korean geomancy, holds that vital energy flows through the land's mountain ridgelines; many feared that surveying — driving iron pins into the slopes — would sever that energy, and resented the colonial surveyors for it.

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