Droplets from the Ocean of Love
New lives emerged where many others had disappeared.
Death and birth collapse and restoration;
despair and hope that sprouts again
The Story of Bong-Soon
By sister-initiate Park So-Youn, Seoul, Korea (Originally in Korean)
In January 2005 I was deeply honored to be a member of the Korean team that went to Sri Lanka to help victims of the South Asian Tsunami. After landing in the country’s capital Colombo we traveled to the severely affected village of Matara, and witnessed the following vivid scenes that revealed the disaster’s devastating effects:
A small, dark-skinned old woman sitting amid collapsed houses with a look of shock on her face… A skinny old man trying to move a heavy stone with his bare hands in front of a house… A stupefied mother holding a piece of withered paper in her hand, looking for her lost baby… Young children who had lost their mothers, their tear-stained faces unwashed … People with expressionless faces, not knowing what to do, without will or aim…
In addition to doing relief work with the villagers I surveyed the area and found that in Matara many stray dogs had found shelter between the collapsed houses and no one was feeding them so I decided to do so.
Watching me share my own food with my fellow creatures, the villagers became curious, smiled strangely and whispered to one another. After several days passed, some of the locals began calling me “a friend of dogs,” told me where I could find other dogs and watched out for me with worried looks when I went out in the dark. Gradually the villagers began to feed the wandering canines themselves as it seemed they were coming to realize that animals are also beings to be taken care of.
Then one day I met a mixed breed dog that was different than the other dogs in the area because she strongly craved human affection. Since she reminded me of a typical Korean mongrel, I named her ‘Bong-Soon’ (after a character in a Korean TV comedy show) because of the good feeling that the name gave me. She always followed me around as I traversed the village, perhaps because I loved to talk to her and pet her.
Bong-Soon was pregnant, and with her full abdomen would lie down to let me pet her. It looked like she would soon give birth and I wondered how her puppies would manage to survive.
As the days passed, Bong-Soon began to have difficulty breathing due to her growing belly. Nonetheless, she came regularly to the relief team’s place of residence to call me with her pathetic voice. I do not recall exactly when Bong-Soon began to wait for me each day, but whenever I came home after finishing my relief work, she would run to me excitedly. She also sometimes waited for me to come out of our place in the early morning, and at some point began to sleep in front of the residence.
After I had worked in Sri Lanka for ten days, the time of my return to Korea was nearing, and Bong-Soon’s abdomen was becoming bigger and bigger. Then one day her amniotic fluid broke but her puppies refused to come out and she was not moving or breathing very well. So I took Bong-Soon into my arms and began searching for a hospital. Finally I found one that accepted her, and it was a great relief for me to hear the news “She’ll be OK.”
On another occasion, Bong-Soon was waiting for me to come home after finishing my relief work. And when I arrived she cried loudly when I tried to go into the house. No matter how many times I said, “Come here, Bong-Soon” she refused to obey and cried with a yowl. So I approached her asking, “Is there anything wrong?” She then guided me to a shabby hole covered by collapsed buildings. The place was very dangerous since no one knew when the structures might cave in, or when cranes would tear them down because restoration work had begun. I then looked for the laborers working in the area, asked them earnestly not to tear down the buildings because one of them was Bong-Soon’s house and was very relieved when they told me, “We’d never do that. Don’t worry.”
I could tell by looking at Bong-Soon’s teeth that she was very young, perhaps about a year old and so this was most likely her first pregnancy. That night, I had a dream that Bong-Soon had given birth and her tiny puppies were in a deep, safe hole that she had dug.
In Korea I direct an animal rights group, and urgent work for the animals back home was piling up constantly so I had to return, leaving Bong-Soon behind. I prayed to God to let her live a little while longer.
Several days later some other relief team members also returned to Korea and informed me that Bong-Soon had given birth to five puppies. She had dug a hole next to the house where we stayed as a den to keep her babies, fulfilling my prophetic dream!
New lives emerged where many others had disappeared. Death and birth collapse and restoration; despair and hope that sprouts again—it is the law of the world in which we live. I can only pray to God to take care of Bong-Soon and her pups and diminish their suffering. I may someday return to Sri Lanka to see my Bong-Soon!
Profile of the author: Sister-initiate Park So-Youn is the director of CARE (Coexistence of Animal Rights on Earth), the largest animal protection organization in Korea.
Dear Master, Would You Please Send Us Those Most in Need? The Story of Bong-Soon
