On the day I arrived in Irbil, Iraq from Kuwait wearing my bulletproof jacket, Korean troops dispatched there were carrying out a civil operations named ¡°Green Angel¡± in an elementary school there. Kites flew high in the sky and the town was crowded with people of all ages wearing traditional costume. War, in the end, is about the life of individuals. Watching a mother and her daughter bake wheat cakes in a yard, I asked myself why it is so difficult to live as peacefully as they seemed to.
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The poet Mun Jeong-hui
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It was a strange emotion watching people dance and sing there. My eyes misted over as Iraqi children sang Korean songs they had learned from soldiers in the Zaytun Unit - it was so reminiscent of my own childhood, when I danced hand in hand with soldiers celebrating the end of the Korean War. How could I explain to these Iraqi children how it came about that most of the Turkish troops who came to Korea during the war to help us were Kurds? There are 260 million Kurds scattered around the world, and 4.1 million live in Iraq. In Irbil, 98 percent of the population are Kurds.
The Korean troops in Irbil, among these people who have been for centuries dispersed around the world without a country to call their own, believe that reconstruction and rehabilitation of the city mean more than just reconstructing damaged buildings or repairing roads. They see it as their mission to comfort people who have been hurt badly by the events of history.
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A girl shows off a Korean flag painted on her cheek to a Korean soldier at an elementary school in the Kurdish-controlled city of Irbil where Korea¡¯s Zaytun Unit is currently stationed for reconstruction work. The Korean soldiers there have received a positive response from locals, especially concerning the division's job-training program dubbed ¡®Green Angel.¡¯
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A beautiful ancient fortress stands in the middle of the city. The fortress, by the river Tigris, contains traces of the royal tombs of the Parthian and Medians mentioned in the Bible and has been designated a World Cultural Heritage Site by UNESCO. Looking around the maze of crumbling walls made from caked loam and sand, I thought how grand it still looked in its decay. In a way, all of us still live in an ancient, crumbling fortress built on sand. When will we be able to forsake the violence of this world and live in a truly civilized society, where there are more musical instruments than deadly weapons?
The poet Mun Jeong-hui was in Irbil, northern Iraq from Feb. 27 until March 4, meeting Korean troops, reading from her poetry and talking to academics at Saladin University there.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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