Sublime

When

With the start of autumn, starving people descended upon the banks of the Tumen River in droves. Those who had relatives in China crossed over in search of food and money; survivors who’d lost loved ones surged across the border along with workers from factories that had shut down, vowing to bring back money and save their families. No one dared to

Our mother’s brother never came back after crossing the river that day. That was probably the winter of 1994, so I would have been eleven years old.