00:00Autumn in South Korea and families gather along the northern border to make offerings to ancestors
00:07whose graves they haven't visited for nearly free generations and, given the current state of affairs,
00:13don't expect to see again in their lifetime.
00:15If you cross straight over, that's my father's hometown. That's where my grandparents are.
00:20Ri Jae-hong tosses a cup of wine towards his father's hometown of Yeombek.
00:24It's now part of North Korea, just two kilometers away, but it might as well be on the moon.
00:30Jae-hong's father fled south during the Korean War.
00:33Soon after, a tense armistice sealed the border in 1953.
00:38Situated at the mouth of the Han River, Gyorang Island welcomed thousands of refugees, like Minook-sun, at the war's end.
00:46On they trudge, North Koreans choosing to become homeless wanderers rather than slaves to a regime
00:51which threatens to engulf the entire Asiatic world.
00:54Every form of transport becomes an evacuation express to a southern destination.
00:59Each wary mile south brings its obstacles...
01:01More than 1.5 million people fled to the south during the war.
01:05Few knew they'd never be able to return.
01:08My parents' graves are only about six kilometers away.
01:12Six kilometers. That's barely ten minutes by car.
01:15Can there be a sadness deeper than this?
01:17For decades, they waited for reunification between North and South Korea, or at least détente, anything to see their families.
01:25Today, 72 years later, telescopes on the islands north are the only way they can glimpse their old hometowns.
01:33We are a people with broken hearts. Even though we live in abundance today, my parents, my brothers and sisters all remained in North Korea.
01:41The North calls the South a hostile state, and tensions between the two sides are worse than they've been in decades.
01:48Pyongyang recently shut down institutions dedicated to reunification, and tore down transport links built in the 2000s when things were a little more hopeful.
01:57With little say in their fate, and aging fast, refugees sing songs that remind them of...
02:02All I long for are my mother and father. I left my hometown at 17, fleeing the war, and I haven't seen them since.
02:15When I see others with their parents, I can't help but envy them, and tears are all that come.
02:21When birds leave their nests under a roof, they always find their way back. That's called the homing instinct. And we humans also have this need to return home.
02:35Like his wife, Kim still dreams of home. But for him, that longing has never faded into peace.
02:41My wife can sleep peacefully under thick blankets and think, this is my resting place. But not me.
02:49Every day, I fight inside, as if I were still at war.
02:54After years of safety and abundance in the South, the last generation to remember a unified Korea fades.
03:01Singing the old songs, before resting in graves just kilometers away from their ancestors, yet impossibly far from home.
03:10Devon Tsai and Bryn Thomas for Taiwan Plus.
Comments