no.70 130709 Thank you for my grandpa's love

Eun-haeng-namu at the school I worked in Korea.

A couple of nights ago, my grandpa called from Korea. He was worried because of train explosion in Quebec and thought our area was affected by it too. He just heard that this happened in Canada and called me, not knowing which region the accident happened. I told him it was in Quebec, which takes about 7 plus hours to drive.

I'm not sure why this conversation came up, but it did when I was on the phone with my grandpa. He told me whenever he sees the 'eun-haeng-na-mu' he thinks about me. Eun-haeng-na-mu means a ginkgo tree in Korean. Eun-haeng-na-mu is my favourite tree in the fall when the leaves change colour. Ginkgos are easily spotted on the streets in Korea. I guess it means that he thinks about me very often. He said he particularly remenisces one occasion. I knew exactly what he was gonna say.

In front of the school I used to work, there was a huge ginko tree. In the fall, it was clothed in a beautiful golden yellow with its stinky seeds. Oh man, those seeds smell sooooo bad. Growing up in Korea, I remember my grandparents picking up the eun-haengs whenever we walked down the street in the fall. I didn't dare touch them because of their horrible smell. For those of you who are unfamiliar with ginkgo trees and their seeds, they look beautiful with the golden fan-shaped leaves. However, when you walk by one, suddenly you'll smell rotting feet. And that is the smell of the ginkgo seed or 'eung-haeng' in Korean. The top layer is the yellow juicy part, where the nasty smell originates from. When you take this part away, you will find a seed which is ivory/sand coloured. Once you crack it open by toasting it, you will find a jelly-like light green seed. This is the edible part. My grandpa says it doesn't smell once you get rid of the top layer, but I think the smell is still embedded in the green jelly part... so I don't eat it. My grandparents, especially my grandpa love them because of their health benefits.

Anyways, back to my story. That giant eun-haeng tree bore a lot of seeds and I thought if I brought them to my grandparents, they will be super happy. I talked to my mentor teacher if I could pick them up and she said normally the vice-president and other teachers do pick up the seeds every autumn. She told me to get one of the male teachers to shake the branches to get the seeds down. Although I wanted to gather the seeds, there was a fear of getting myself covered in that wonderful smell of ginkgo. You must wear gloves (I suggest you double, even triple the layer of gloves) before harvesting the eun-haeng. Thankfully, one teacher kindly picked up the seeds for me, and even peeled the first stinky layer off so that I could take them to my grandparents' house, which was two hours bus ride from my school. She gave me a bag full of eun-haengs. I was sooooo thankful for her kind gesture. If she hadn't done that for me, the smell would stink up the whole bus and I would be yelled at. I remember the day I was really excited to visit my grandparents' house thinking how happy they will be. It made me feel good seeing smiles on my grandparents' face. They too appreciated my co-teacher's help. When I spoke to my grandpa on the phone yesterday, he told me that the eun-haengs you find on the streets are not edible anymore due to the pollution.

I'm thankful for my grandpa's love for me. Although he doesn't express by saying 'I miss you' I know he misses me and thinks about me when I hear him talk about things we did together when I was in Korea. On days like this, I wish I was living in the same country as my grandparents. Tonight, I really miss my grandparents.