final portfolio
DESCRIPTION
Matthew Chun's final portfolio for the ENGL-115 C101 Creative Writing courseTRANSCRIPT
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Chun’s Portfolio Final draft
Engl-115 C101 Creative Writing
5/9/2013
Howard Community College
Matthew Chun
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1 | P a g e
Content
1. Gray Television 2
2. Bottle Collection 4
3. The Road and Walkers 6
4. Birthday 8
5. The ordinary adventurer story 10
6. Wounds, what wounds? 12
7. The best friend 15
8. Pre-revised short stories 16
9. Reflections 27
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2 | P a g e
Gray Television
Walking into an empty room
The empty white lonely room
Where only an old gray television
Shouting for people to watch and listen
The old gray television in the empty room
What are you trying to talk about?
In the empty white lonely room
Where no one else can listen to you
Wine and cheese, rose between rich and poor, drama of hope and love
This is what you want to talk about?
Waving flags, cheerful people, energetic sportsman
That is what you want to talk about?
White-dwarf, a hundred million light years away from where we are, observed by astronomers
Politicians, asking for support by speeches of ambiguous promises
War in the Middle East, dying people, starving children
Is this what you want to talk about?
So many people asked him the question yet no one had the answer
Walking out of the empty white lonely room
And wondering why he shouted for no one
While no one questioned him
Are you lonely?
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3 | P a g e
Gray Television (Pre-revised)
Walking into an empty room
The empty white lonely room
Where only an old gray television
Shouting for people to watch and listen
The old gray television in the empty room
What are you trying to talk about?
In the empty white lonely room
Where no one else can listen to you
Wine and cheese, rose between rich and poor, drama of hope and love
This is what you want to talk about?
Waving flags, cheerful people, energetic sportsman
That is what you want to talk about?
White-dwarf, a hundred million light years away from where we are, observed by
astronomers
Politicians, asking for support by speech of ambiguous promises
War in the Middle East, dying people, starving children
Is this what you want to talk about?
So many people asked him the question yet no one had the answer
Walking out of the empty white lonely room
And wondering why he shout for no one
While no one questioned him
Are you lonely?
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4 | P a g e
Bottle Collection
Sitting on the bar
Looking at the collection of bottles
Bottles made of glass
Collections that looks many but few
Fragile yet so beautiful glass
bluff with the reflection of themselves
Just like people, so beautiful and clear
Just like people, so fragile and hides the true-self
inside the illusion.
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5 | P a g e
Bottle Collection (Pre-revised)
Sitting on the bar
Looking at the collection of bottles
Bottles those are made with glasses
Collection that looks many but few
Fragile yet so beautiful glasses
bluff with the reflection of themselves
Just like people, so beautiful and clear
Just like people, so fragile and hide the true-self
inside the illusion.
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6 | P a g e
The Road and Walkers
So many roads are ahead
Waiting to be walked by the people
Men who seek the future
Various types of people
Walk different types of uncharted path
No man shares the road
Some of them succeeded
Yet some men failed
And caged by depression
People afraid to walk
Are left behind and mock who
Walk and failed and are depressed
But they have courage
To break the cage and walk forward
True pathfinders of future
People afraid of failure
Have learned, not by who easily succeeded
But who get over the failure
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7 | P a g e
The Road and walkers (Pre-revised)
So many roads are ahead
Waiting to be walked by the people
Men who seek the future
Various types of people
Walk different types of uncharted path
No man shares the road
Some of them succeeded
Yet some men failed to the ground
And caged by depression
People afraid to walk
Are left behind and mock who
Walk and fail and depressed
But they have courage
To break the cage and walk forward
True pathfinders of future
People who afraid the failure
Have learned, not by who easily succeeded
But who get over the failure
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8 | P a g e
Birthday
When he was a little child
He did not know what he wanted to be
When he was a young man
He did not know what he wanted to learn
When he was a business man
He did not know what he wanted to do
Now he stands, with wrinkles and scars in his heart
He now knows what he wanted to do
He now knows what he wanted to learn
He now became what he wanted to be
It was a birth of a baby
As if it was a birthday of the little child, who became a father
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9 | P a g e
Birthday (Pre-revised)
When he was a little child
He did not know what he wanted to be
When he was a young man
He did not know what he wanted to learn
When he was a business man
He did not know what he wanted to do
Now he stands, with wrinkles and scars in heart
He now knows what he wanted to do
He now knows what he wanted to learn
He now became what he wanted to be
It was a birth of a baby
As if it was a birthday of the little child, who became father
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10 | P a g e
The ordinary adventurer story
A man was walking. For the last whole month, he was walking across the forest,
eating only bugs and rain water after his reserved breads and water ran out. He wore a
tattered brown robe over clothes, a rusty sword at his side and a crystal ring on his left hand.
His appearance was hidden under his hood but his red eyes gleamed like a wolf under the
shadow.
“Water... water... spider... damn spider... I need water...” The Red-eyed swordsman
rattled. After several more minutes, desperately patched and hungry, he saw a bright light
over some trees ahead. When he finally reached a borderline of forest, he had reached the
limit of what his body could handle and fainted, falling on the ground.
A loud noise woke the red eyed swordsman up. He was in a stranger’s house, lying
on a bed. Looking around the room, nothing special yet it seems only one person lived in this
house. Another loud noise hit his ears when he was trying to realize the situation. Scream and
crying of terrified villagers came from outside. The swordsman got up. His body was covered
in bandages; it was probably his savior’s work. He put his pants on and grabbed his rusty
sword. He realized the situation clearly when he opened the door and step out from where he
was.
Bandits. Ten or more so of organized bandits attacked the small village. The town
guards had already been taken out. No one died yet but several villagers include town guards
were severely injured. Bandits were threatening the villagers but it was not the swordsman’s
concern. The red-eyed swordsman took a glimpse of the bandits; ten hostiles who have four
crossbows, two sword and shield, three axes, and a magician. The magician seems to be their
boss. When the observation was over, swordsman draws his rusty sword. It wasn’t his sword.
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11 | P a g e
He picked up from the forest when he lost his sword fighting a giant spider. The blood of
spider corrupted his sword so he had to let it go.
“Oh, was there another villager?” the magician spotted the swordsman. “He has a
nice sword, guys! It really fits on him, ha-ha. Well, put him down!” Three crossbow-volts
from the crossbows were fired. The swordsman dodged and ran toward the closest enemy.
One, two, bandits were taken out by him each time he wield his sword. Crossbows were too
slow to reload and the swordsman knew it. When the rusty sword was broken by a shield, the
swordsman grabbed his enemy and used him as a shield when another volt was shot. He
picked up his sword, the swordsman marched. Crossbowmen threw away their weapon and
draw their sword but it was too late, the swordsman’s sword finished them off. All the bandits
were neutralized except one, the magician. He was casting a spell the whole time, waiting the
swordsman to be exhausted and stay put. Fires came from his hands and began to form into a
ball.
“I wouldn’t do it if I were you.” Swordsman said. The magician laughed and threw a
fireball to his opponent. Swordsman did not dodge this time. Instead, he opened his left hand
toward the magic. The fireball exploded when it touched the target’s hand. Explosion and fire,
the magician laughed and shouted “Fool!” But something was sparkling inside the explosion.
The shape of man was behind the fire. The swordsman was still, with his crystal ring shining
from his finger. The same exact fireball came out from the ring, fired to its maker. “Magic
reflection ring.” The swordsman said, “I told you I wouldn’t do that.” And he smiled.
The situation was over. Villagers came out from their home and praised the
swordsman, their hero. The village elder came to him and asked him, what do you want? And
the swordsman simply replied “Water and new clothes.”
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12 | P a g e
Wounds, what wounds?
Do-gok was where my family and I lived together. Father, mother, and me; only 3 of
us lived together. My parents spent most of their time at work and I had to spend my time
alone until my parents came back. My kindergarten friends lived far from where I lived. It
was hard to make friends without being introduced. It was complicated to approach strangers
and ask them to play with me. However, once I met them it was more natural. Afraid of being
rejected was the biggest foe.
So I made friends, not many, but worthy friends. All of them went to different
kindergarten but we shared one aspect; our parents went to work and we had to spend times
until they came back. Under that common aspect, we united as the best friends ever. We were
all lonely and had to fill our empty spaces when parents leave us behind. We did not blame
our parents. It was a dreadful time for Koreans. Every single adult who was capable of
working had to work in order to feed their family. Even though we were all young, we knew
it clearly. But if I said I was not disappointed, it would be a lie.
We used to play in the playground. There was only one old and rusty playground
around where we lived. Although it was old, it did have what we called ‘necessary’ apparatus
such as a swing, a merry go ‘round, and a slide. The most popular playground apparatus was
the slide. People loved it, my friends loved it, and I loved it too. There were bunch of
different ways to play with a slide. Sliding with different poses was my personal favorite.
Adults said it was dangerous but, let’s be honest, how many children would have listened to
adults? Exactly.
Every single day felt the same. The same faces and the same happenings and it was
not any different from other days. I went straight to the playground as soon as my
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13 | P a g e
kindergarten was over.
“Hi, Kyu”
“Where have you been?”
“Come on, join us!”
Greetings welcomed me. Meeting the same faces every day, yet I never got tired of it.
Even though we played with same materials and same games, such as hide-and-seek, over
and over again, it was fun. It did feel boring sometimes but when it did, we just sat around
and make jokes to get over it.
“Let’s play tag,” One of my friends, my best friend, Su-gon said.
“As usual.” I added a comment. Everyone giggled and Su-gon seemed a little bit embarrassed.
“Have any better ideas?” He said,
“Nope, let’s play tag.”
“I thought you don’t wanna play tag.”
“Nope, let’s play tag.”
Half right and half wrong, I did not like to play tag. I never did. But in this case, I
had no other options. We choose the tagger by rock-paper-scissors. Today’s tagger was Su-
gon.
“Three-Two-One, here I go!”
Su-gon said. I had no idea but he chased me so hard like a cat chasing a mouse. He
did not even look at other friends but me. I was sly but not as fast or with as much endurance
as he.
“Why do you keep chasing me? Dea-yong was right next to you!” I asked,
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14 | P a g e
“Because I hate you!” He replied like it was obvious.
I went up to the slide, trying to evade him by jump off the slide, but Su-gon was
faster than I thought and got me. The problem was, we were on the top of the slide and he
could not kill the speed. We crashed, slid to the bottom. Su-gon was on top of me, using me
as a sled. I was laying face down whole time, pressed hard by the weight of human body.
When we hit the bottom, friends ran toward us and asked if Su-gon and I were okay. Su-gon
did not care about them but asked me as soon as he got off from me. I said I can live with it
because I did not want to look weak. The pain hurt, and was warm, and wet. Wet? My friends
seemed terrified and so as Su-gon. I touched my chin. Red liquid was coming out. A whole
lot of red liquid was coming out from my chin. I was bleeding.
“AAAARGH!!!”
“AAAAAARGH!!!”
Everyone, include me, was in panic, screaming crazily while standing still about a
minute. The first person who regained his mind was Su-gon. He asked if my parents were at
home. I said no. He then asked friends the same thing but no one responded. Most of them
were still in panic. He brought me to his home. His mother tried to greet me but as soon as
she spotted me, she panicked also. However, she was an adult and knew how to manage the
calm. She called the 911 and brought me to the hospital. It wasn’t a big deal but I had to have
small surgery. My mother arrived after the surgery and said thanks to Su-gon’s mother. It was
strange that I saw my mom while the sun was still up. I guess I should be grateful to Su-gon
for that. It was fun and a worthy day.
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15 | P a g e
Gender Switched: The best friend (Original: Wound, what wound)
Do-Gok was where I and my family lived together. Father, mother, and me; only 3 of
us lived together. My parents spend most of their time in work and I had to spend my time
alone until my parents came back. It was a bit lonely for a little girl but I adapted to it. I had a
bunch of different dolls and clothes for them. Every day I gave my dolls names and role
played with them. The family was in harmony and never fought with each other. Every day, I
played with dolls. It was fun but suddenly it felt so depressed. I wanted to talk with other
people... No, I wanted to get talked to by other people.
So I made friends, not many but worthy friends. All of them went to different
kindergarten but we shared one aspect, our parents went to work and we had to spend time
until they came back. Under that common aspect, we united as the best friends ever even
though some of us were girls and others were boys. We were all lonely and had to fill our
empty spaces when parents left us behind. We did not blame our parents. It was not a good
time for Koreans. Every single adult who was capable of working had to work in order to
feed their family. Even though we were all young, we knew it clearly. But if I say I was not
disappointed, it would be a lie.
We used to play in the playground. There was only one, old and rusty playground
around where we lived. Although it was old, it did have what we called ‘necessary’ apparatus
such as a swing, a merry go ‘round, and a slide. The most popular playground apparatus was
the slide. People loved it, my friends loved it, yet I did not really like it. It seemed to old and
rusty. I believed it would make my dress dusty if I play with it. I just wanted to chat with
friends. One of my friends, Su-Yong, was an athletic and energetic girl who loved to play
with it. I liked her, and almost envyed her character.
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16 | P a g e
She was shameless and tomboyish but she had something that attracted people
around her. She talked to strangers first. She helped people who needed a favor even before
anyone asked her. I gave up thinking how she could be so friendly to strangers. It was her
motto; approach first if a stranger needs help.
She was the one who invited me to her, now ‘our,’ friends. I was walking around the
playground, watching people who were playing. There were bunches of boys and a few girls.
Girls were playing on the corner of the playground and played house. It looked fun but I did
not really want my dress get dusty by sands so I kept my distance. It didn’t take a long time
me to realize that it wasn’t because of the dust but that I was afraid; afraid of getting rejected.
I was shy. When I was wasting my time wondering around the playground, she approached
me.
“Hey,” she said.
At first, I thought it was a boy. She was dressed like a boy, looked like a boy, and
played with boys in such an athletic manner; playing tag, pseudo wrestling, and fighting with
fists sometimes. I was actually shocked when I heard her voice since it was more girlish than
I expected.
“Hi,” I replied.
She smiled and said why I did not play along with them. I rejected the offer as soon
as I heard it. No way. I don’t like getting my clothes dirty, plus, I don’t want to get sweaty. I
was a shy person, but I really didn’t want to get sweaty under the sun and on the dusty old
playground. When she heard my words, she smiled in a weird manner; just like saying ‘You
are a bad liar.’
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17 | P a g e
“Okay than, so be it.” She said, “But don’t say I didn’t ask, alright? It’s just so lonely
watching people playing rather than actually playing with them.”
She was right, but more importantly; she was watching me the whole time. I realized
that it was so embarrassing to be observed at an embarrassing moment by other people. Her
words actually hurt my feelings. What did you want to say? Did you want to say that I was an
outcast who doesn’t have any friends?
She looked at my face and turned around and headed back to her friends, saying “She
said she doesn’t want to play with us because she thinks she can’t win against me!”
“What!” I said, “What are you talking about!”
“Well, I said you are a coward, and if you have any complaint,” She smiled at me and ran
away from me. “Come and get me.”
I don’t exactly remember what actually happened after that. I was so mad and tried to
catch her until the twilight. I believe I used a few curse words in the process. After the chase,
the last of my memory was she was laughing so hard, yet I was laughing with her. It was the
first meeting with my best friend Su-Yong. She was always like that; warm consideration
under a rude behavior. I wonder how many years have passed from then. We separated when
I had to move to America. I wonder what she might doing right now, maybe helping other
people?
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18 | P a g e
Pre-revised Short Stories
1. The ordinary adventurer story 19
2. Wounds, what wounds? 21
3. Gender Switched: The best friend 24
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19 | P a g e
The ordinary adventurer story (Pre-revised)
A man was walking. For the last whole month, he was walking across the forest,
eating only bugs and rain water when his reserved breads and water ran out. What he had
right now was a tattered brown robe and clothes he was wearing, a rusty steel arming sword
on his side, and a crystal ring on his left hand. His appearance was hided under his hood but
his red eye gleamed like a wolf under the shadow.
“Water... water... spider... damn spider... I need water...” The red eyed swordsman
rattled. After several more minute, struggling with thrust and hunger, he saw a bright light
over trees. When he finally reached a borderline of forest, he hit the limit and fainted on dirty
ground.
A loud noise woke the red eyed swordsman up. He was in a stranger’s house, lying
on a bed. Looking around the room, nothing special yet it seems only one person live in this
house. Another loud noise hit his ears when he was trying to realize the situation. Scream and
crying of terrified villagers came from outside. The swordsman got up. His body was covered
in bandages; it was probably his savior’s work. He put his pants on and grabbed his rusty
sword. He realized situation clearly when he opened the door and step out from where he was.
Bandits. Ten or more so of organized bandits attacked the small village. Town guards
seem taken out already. No one died yet but several villagers include town guards were
severely injured. Bandits were threatening the villagers but it was not the swordsman’s
concern. Four crossbows, two sword and shield, three axes, and a magician. The magician
seems to be their boss. When the observation was over, swordsman draws his rusty sword. It
wasn’t his sword. He picked up from the forest when he lost his sword fighting a giant spider.
The blood of spider corrupted his sword so he had to let it go.
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20 | P a g e
“Oh, was there another villager?” the magician spotted the swordsman. “He has a
nice sword, guys! It really fits on him, ha-ha. Well, put him down!” Three volts from the
crossbows were fired. The swordsman dodged and ran toward the closest enemy. One, two,
bandits were taken out by him each time he wield his sword. Crossbows were too slow to
reload and the swordsman knew it. When the rusty sword got broken by a shield, the
swordsman grabbed his enemy and used him as a shield when another volt was shot. Picked
up his sword, the swordsman marched. Crossbowmen threw away their weapon and draw
their sword but it was too late, the swordsman’s sword finished them off. All the bandits were
neutralized except one, the magician. He was casting a spell the whole time, waiting the
swordsman to be exhausted and stay put. Fires came from his hands and began to make a
form of ball.
“I wouldn’t do it if I were you.” Swordsman said. The magician laughed and threw a
fireball to his opponent. Swordsman did not dodge this time. Instead, he opened his left hand
toward the magic. The fireball exploded when it touched the target’s hand. Explosion and fire,
the magician laughed and shouted “Fool!” But something was sparkling inside the explosion.
The shape of man was behind the fire. The swordsman was still, with his crystal ring shining
from his finger. The same exact fireball came out from the ring, fired to its maker. “Magic
reflection ring.” The swordsman said, “I told you I wouldn’t do that.” And he smiled.
The situation was over. Villagers came out from their home and praised the
swordsman, their hero. The village elder came to him and asked him, what do you want? And
the swordsman simply replied “Water and new clothes.”
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21 | P a g e
Wounds, what wounds? (Pre-revised)
Do-gok was where I and my family lived together. Father, mother, and me; only 3 of
us lived together. My parents spend most of their time in work and I had to spend my time by
alone until my parents came back. My kindergarten friends lived far from where I lived. It
was hard to make friends without being introduced. It is not complicated yet approach to
strangers and ask to play with me is really hard to do so. Afraid of being rejected was the
biggest foe.
So I made friends, not many but worthy friends. All of them went to different
kindergarten but we shared one aspect, our parents went to work and we had to waste times
until they came back. Under that common aspect, we united as the best friends ever. We were
all lonely and had to fill our empty spaces where parents leave it behind. We did not blame
our parents. It was dreadful time for Koreans. Every single adults who are capable of working
had to work in order to feed their family. Even we were all young, we knew it clearly. But if I
say I did not disappointed, it would be lie.
We used to play in the playground. There was only one, old and rusty playground
around where we lived. Although it was old, it did have what we called ‘necessary’ apparatus
such as a swing, a merry go ‘round, and a slide. The most popular playground apparatus was
the slide. People loved it, my friends loved it, and I loved it too. There were bunch of
different way to play with slide. Sliding with different poses was my personal favorite. Adults
said it was dangerous but, let’s be honest, how many children would have listened to adults?
Exactly.
Every single day felt like a same day. Same faces and same happenings, it was not
different from other days. I went straight to the playground as soon as my kindergarten was
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22 | P a g e
over.
“Hi, Kyu” “Where have you been?” “Come on, join us!”
Greetings welcomed me. Meeting the same faces every day, yet I never get tired of it.
Even though we played with same materials and same game, such as hide-and-seek, over and
over again, it was fun. I did felt boring sometimes but when it does, we just sat around and
make jokes to get over it.
“Let’s play tag,” One of my friends, my best friend, Su-gon said.
“As usual.” I added a comment. Everyone giggled and Su-gon seemed a little bit
embarrassing.
“Have any better ideas?” He said,
“Nope, let’s play tag.”
“I thought you don’t wanna play tag.”
“Nope, let’s play tag.”
Half right and half wrong, I did not like play tag. I never did. But in this case, I had
no other options. We choose tagger by rock-paper-scissors. Today’s tagger was Su-gon.
“Three-Two-One, here I go!”
Su-gon said. I had no idea but he chased me so hard like a cat chasing mouse. He did
not even look at other friends but me. I was sly but not as fast and endurance as him.
“Why are you keep chasing me! Dea-yong was right next to you!” I asked,
“Because I hate you!” He replied like it was obvious.
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23 | P a g e
I went up to the slide, tried to evade by jump off the slide, but Su-gon was faster than
I thought and got me. The problem was, we were on the top of the slide and he could not kill
the speed. We crashed, slid to the bottom. Su-gon was on top of me, using me as a sled. I was
laying face down whole time, pressed hard by weight of human body. When we hit the
bottom, friends ran toward us and asked if I and Su-gon were okay. Su-gon did not care about
them but asked me as soon as he got off from me. I said I can live with it because I did not
want to be looked weak. It was hurt, worm, and wet. Wet? My friends seemed terrified and so
as Su-gon. I touched my chin. Red liquid was coming out. A whole lot of red liquid was
coming out from my chin. I was bleeding.
“AAAARGH!!!”
“AAAAAARGH!!!”
Everyone, include me, was in panic, screaming crazily while standing still about a
minute. The first person who regained his mind was Su-gon. He asked if my parents were at
home. I said no. He then asked friends same thing but no one responded. Most of them were
still in panic. He brought me to his home. His mother tried to greet me but as soon as she
spotted me, she panicked also. However, she was adult and knew how to manage the calm.
She called the 911 and brought me to the hospital. It wasn’t a big deal but I had to take a
small surgery. My mother arrived after the surgery and said thanks to Su-gon’s mother. It was
strange that I saw my mom while the sun was still up. I guess I should be grateful to Su-gon
for that. It was fun and worthy day.
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24 | P a g e
Gender Switched: The best friend (Pre-revised) (Original: Wound, what wound)
Do-Gok was where I and my family lived together. Father, mother, and me; only 3 of
us lived together. My parents spend most of their time in work and I had to spend my time by
alone until my parents came back. It was a bit lonely for a little girl but I adapt to it. I had
bunch of different dolls and clothes. Every day I gave my dolls names and role played with
them. The family was in harmony and never fought with each other. Every day, I played with
dolls. It was fun but suddenly it felt so depressing. I wanted to talk with other people... No, I
wanted to get talked by other people.
So I made friends, not many but worthy friends. All of them went to different
kindergarten but we shared one aspect, our parents went to work and we had to waste times
until they came back. Under that common aspect, we united as the best friends ever even
though some of us were girls and others were boys. We were all lonely and had to fill our
empty spaces where parents leave it behind. We did not blame our parents. It was not a good
time for Koreans. Every single adults who are capable of working had to work in order to
feed their family. Even we were all young, we knew it clearly. But if I say I did not
disappointed, it would be lie.
We used to play in the playground. There was only one, old and rusty playground
around where we lived. Although it was old, it did have what we called ‘necessary’ apparatus
such as a swing, a merry go ‘round, and a slide. The most popular playground apparatus was
the slide. People loved it, my friends loved it, yet I did not really like it. It seemed to old and
rusty. I believed it would make my dress dusty if I play with it. I just wanted to chat with
friends. One of my friends, Su-Yong, was athletic and energetic girl who loved play with it. I
liked her, almost envy her character.
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25 | P a g e
She was shameless and tomboyish but she had something that attracts people around
her. She talked to strangers first. She helped people who needed her favor even before anyone
asked her to. I gave up thinking how she can be so friendly to strangers. It was her motto;
approach first if a stranger needs help.
She was the one who invited me to her, now ‘our,’ friends. I was walking around the
playground, watching people who were playing. There were bunch of boys and few girls.
Girls were playing on the corner of the playground and played house. It looked fun but I did
not really want my dress get dusty by sands so I kept my distance. It didn’t take a long time
me to realize that it wasn’t because of the dust but I was afraid; afraid of getting rejected. I
was shy. When I was wasting my time wondering around the playground, she approached to
me.
“Hey,” she said.
At first, I thought it was a boy. She wore like a boy, looked like a boy, and played
with boys in such an athletic manner; playing tag, pseudo wrestling, and fight with fist
sometime. I was actually shocked when I heard her voice since it was so girlish than I
expected.
“Hi,” I replied.
She smiled and said why I don’t play along with them. I rejected the offer as soon as
I hear it. No way. I don’t like getting my clothes dirty, plus, I don’t want to get sweaty. I was
shy person, as I admitted, but I really didn’t want to get sweaty under sun in the dusty old
playground. When she heard my word, she smiled in a weird manner; just like saying ‘You
are a bad liar.’
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26 | P a g e
“Okay than, so be it.” She said, “But don’t say I didn’t ask for it, alright? It’s just so lonely
watching people playing rather than actually play with them.”
She was right, but more importantly; she was watching me the whole time. I realized
that it was so embarrassing to be observed an embarrassing moment by other people. Her
word actually hurt my feeling. What did you want to say? Did you want to say that I was an
outcast who doesn’t have any friend?
She looked at my face and turned around and headed back to her friends, saying “She
said she doesn’t want to play with us because she thinks she can’t win against me!”
“What!” I said, “What are you talking about!”
“Well, I said you are a coward, and if you have any complain,” She smiled at me and ran
away from me. “Come and get me.”
I don’t exactly remember what actually happened after that. I was so mad and tried to
catch her until the twilight. I believe I used few curse word in the process. After the chase,
last of my memory was she laughing so hard, yet I was laughing with her. It was the first
meeting with my best friend Su-Yong. She was always like that; warm consideration under a
rude behavior. I wonder how many years have passed from then. We separated when I had to
move to America. I wonder what she might doing right now, maybe helping other people?
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Reflection
Before I took this class, I never thought about myself, writing stories and poems with
such an emotional manner. I’ am not saying my works are emotional. I am saying that I was
actually focusing on the creative writing. My major is psychology and everything about
psychology is being formal, excluding all emotions which might corrupt the final report.
Psychologists wanted me to be gray. It was not really hard to do so even though I was an
emotional person. If subjects showed any action by experimental variables, I just had to write
down what happened without any fancy words. And one day, I went to advisor and ask her
what course I need to take for graduation. She said I need to take the ENGL-115 Creative
Writing class. It did not make any sense. I already took ENGL-121 and got C out from it. I
barely passed the basic English course and you want me to take WHAT? She did not force me
to do it. She made up my mind by simply giving me all the other options I can take;
Shakespeare, Screenplay, and Child-book writing. Okay, I said. Not that I am afraid of
Shakespeare or anything, I just remembered that I always wanted to write creative writing, of
course. So here I am, finished the course without failing it. It was a satisficing course that
revived my emotions which might not be helpful for psychology. I don’t regret it. It was fun
after all.
Revision process
The biggest problem of my works was in the short writings. I was born with bad
English grammar and nonsensical choosing of words. Yes, the problem was in grammar. Just
like other international students, I have a bad English grammar. At first, I asked my Korean
friends to fix my grammars. They were willing to fix it and the results seemed satisfying. Yet
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28 | P a g e
I always got only 1 out of 3 points of grammars every single time. I asked myself, do I have
to be perfect at grammar to get 2 out of 3? What is this madness? I just don’t get it! Well,
reality was always bitter than I thought, and I was fully aware of it. I had to do something
about my grammar fast and precisely. The first option I had was ask other classmates about
my grammar. Yet I failed to do so because of two reasons; one unfortunate and one arrogant
reason. First, I was a shy person. No, I AM a shy person. I was always afraid of talking to
others and it will not change any sooner. Second, I was afraid that they might be wrong. Yes,
I did not trust my classmates. “If I get a help, I want it from the best.” Now that was such an
arrogant statement… by me. So I had to find other option, an easy but trustworthy option. I
went to English lab and asked advisor to fix my works. The advisor helped me with verb
tenses/ forms, word order/ syntax, articles, and prepositions. The revision took about 20
minute total. I never used English lab until now and I think I can get this kind of help more
often.
Organization
My work organization for this portfolio may be awkward for people who are other
than me. What a minority people! It was a joke, of course. Back to the topic, I separated my
works in two part; poems and short writings. If you print this out in 2 pages in one paper
format, you can clearly see that the poems are in 1 by 1 position where left is revised work
and the right is pre-revised work. The reason was simply because it was way easier to
compare between them. Not like stories, poems are easy to read. They are short but highly
organized. It can even feel like an artwork (literally) if you do not know what language the
poem was written. So I added the pre-revised one right next to the revised works so that
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29 | P a g e
people can see the changes more easily. However, I did not put the pre-revised short stories
next to the revised pieces because I think it is not easy to compare and it would be boring to
read same stories over again. I wanted to show audience different topic as fast as I can to
keep them interested. One of my friend said the good stories may not have a polished
grammars, but it has to be interesting. I added a new content page just for pre-revised short
stories that my original content page for revised works is a single page. I personally think
content page should be a single page if the topics are not that many. It is easier to read and
find what they really wanted to read. Not just works but even page numbers are moved right
to left. When I printed my portfolio for revision, it was really hard to find pages when the
page numbers on the right. So I moved them to left.