The Brightest Star in Yongsan
Ki-jo kept pressing the government, together with Chang Key-young of the Hankook Ilbo and Otto de Camp of CBS. In an editorial the Hankook Ilbo lashed the authorities for hoarding weather information they were perfectly able to release to the people, and CBS declared that even if the government objected, it would broadcast over the radio whatever meteorological data it had obtained.
At that, the government's attitude shifted, if only slightly. Mindful of public opinion, it scrambled to keep from losing control of the forecasts.
In the end, the terms agreed with the Ministry of National Defense and the Ministry of Communications were these.
1. No detailed forecasts shall be issued city by city or region by region within the country.
2. The government shall not be named as the source. Should a forecast prove wrong and complaints or claims for damages follow, the three companies that issued it shall bear the responsibility in full.
3. Whenever the government so requests, the forecasts must be halted at once.
4. Every forecast shall be issued only after it has passed government censorship.
A toxic clause was lodged in every item, but Ki-jo, Chang Key-young, and de Camp resolved to accept them all. For now, simply being allowed to forecast the weather at all was something. Once the three-cornered front of newspaper, radio, and television began issuing forecasts, the reach of that information would plainly be stronger than before.
Ki-jo moved on to the second undertaking in preparation for Typhoon Agnes: a venture to manufacture food for the relief of flood victims. To suit relief rations, it had to meet several conditions.
1. It must require neither water nor fuel to prepare.
2. It must be ready to eat at once.
3. It must be easy to store, transport, and manage.
4. And still it must not be expensive.
The first thing Ki-jo conceived was ramen, but it failed every one of those conditions and was struck from the list. Instant ramen did not yet exist anywhere in the world. Nissin Foods of Japan would invent it in 1958, the first of its kind, and in Korea Samyang Ramen would not reach the market until 1963. He could have tried to make it on the strength of his capital, but launching ramen before August was more than he could manage.
And price was the trouble. Even when ramen debuted in Korea in 1963, it was by no means cheap. The noodles had to be extruded and fried in oil, and a powdered soup produced besides; through that process the manufacturing cost climbed enormously. As of 1963 a single pack cost ten won. Jajangmyeon, the black-bean noodles, was twenty won then, and a plain rice meal thirty. Reckoned in the value of the 2020s, one pack came to roughly three thousand won. Supplying that in bulk to flood victims was out of the question.
And decisively, boiling ramen required clean water and fuel. In the twenty-first century portable gas burners were commonplace and water came bottled in plastic, but the 1950s were not that world. In a flooded district there was nothing but contaminated water, and fuel to boil it was hard to find.
After long deliberation, what Ki-jo settled on was hardtack.
He was looking into properties for sale, meaning to acquire a hardtack plant, when Ma-ryang came to see him. It had been some time since his brother-in-law had sought him out, and Ki-jo broke into a wide smile—but there was a shade of worry on Ma-ryang's face.
"Hyung-nim, there's something I'd like to talk over with you."
"Oh? Sit down and tell me."
Facing him, Ki-jo wondered whether something had gone amiss in the marriage. His sister-in-law loved Ma-ryang so fiercely that it seemed unlikely, and yet no one ever truly knew what passed between a husband and wife.
"Soon-young says she wants to start a company in Yongsan that makes sweets and bread."
"Hm..."
Ki-jo rubbed one ear and gathered his thoughts. Once before, his sister-in-law had said she hoped Cheongsan would have a confectionery plant of its own. He could not have said why, but he had the feeling that if Soon-young wanted to do a thing, it would turn out well. And Ma-ryang was a rich man. As owner of the Changseong, the first ship of the Cheongsan Shipping line, he received fifty thousand dollars a year in charter fees from Cheongsan Shipping. Ma-ryang and Soon-young were family, and the Changseong sailed under Cheongsan's flag, but Ki-jo had settled the vessel's ownership on them beyond any doubt. It was the third year since the ship had come to Korea, and the money already received stood at a hundred and fifty thousand dollars. In private fortune, the couple was richer than Ki-jo's own household.
"Give it a try," said Ki-jo, who believed a great fortune attended his sister-in-law.
Ma-ryang was a little thrown that he agreed to Soon-young's wish so easily.
"It'll be fine. I'll help you. You make the hardtack, and I'll buy every bit of it."
"Hardtack, you say?"
"Yes, hardtack. The kind soldiers eat."
"Aren't there already plenty of hardtack plants in Yongsan?"
He was right. Yongsan was full of confectionery factories. Under Japanese rule, seven confectionery companies had set up there: Gyeongseong Confectionery in Galwol-dong, Yeonggang Confectionery in Namyeong-dong, Janggok Confectionery in Huam-dong, Daeseo Confectionery in Yongmun-dong, Gungbon Confectionery in front of Yongsan Police Station, and, at Samgakji, Pungguk Confectionery and Joseon Confectionery.
They had clustered in Yongsan because Japanese residents packed the district, and because the headquarters of the Japanese army stationed in Korea had stood where the U.S. Eighth Army headquarters now stood. Japanese confectioners had gathered one by one to sell sweets to the Japanese living there, and when the Second Sino-Japanese War broke out they made hardtack near the army headquarters and supplied it to the military.
"The truth is, I'd been thinking of taking over a hardtack plant myself. But if my sister-in-law makes the hardtack, that's all the better for me."
At that Ma-ryang gave a loose laugh.
"What are you laughing at?"
"Truth is, Soon-young wanting a confectionery plant was on account of you, hyung-nim."
"Because of me?"
"Aye. Didn't you put up a little bakery in Yongsan, give the children work, and feed them bread besides?"
"I did."
"She went and had a look at the place, and didn't she come back saying she wanted to do that same good work herself?"
"She said that?"
"She did. All your doing, hyung-nim. Ha ha ha."
Ki-jo laughed with him.
"While you're at it, put it in Yongsan. Or else take over a factory that's already standing."
A few days later Soon-young went about Yongsan with Ma-ryang and bought, lock, stock, and barrel, a factory that caught her eye. Astonishingly, it was the old Pungguk Confectionery plant—the very factory that Tongyang Confectionery, later to make its name with Choco Pie, had acquired in 1955.
After the purchase, Soon-young and Ma-ryang came to Ki-jo's house to talk, and her reason for taking over Tongyang's Yongsan plant was simple.
"There's a candy called King Drops, and it tastes wonderful. The children are going to love it."
Sunrye, uneasy that her younger sister had swallowed the plant's facilities and its workforce whole in one great gulp, asked with a worried face.
"Who's going to run the factory? Your husband will be busy working with your brother-in-law. Are you going to do it yourself?"
"Yes. I am."
Sunrye was aghast, but Ki-jo smiled and nodded.
"Soon-young, once you've taken over a factory you have to run it as a business. A business that doesn't make money goes under..."
"I know. If I make it taste good, won't it sell? And buying the factory only cost eighty thousand dollars. Fifty thousand comes in off Ma-ryang's ship every year—there's no way we can go broke."
Soon-young simply overwhelmed her older sister. While Sunrye sat too dumbfounded to speak, Ki-jo stepped in.
"That's right. It will absolutely not fail."
He set Sunrye at ease, encouraged Soon-young, and then turned to Ma-ryang.
"Can the plant turn out hardtack as well?"
"I looked the place over, and the equipment is still there. The plant manager says they were planning to make biscuits too."
"Ah, good. That's excellent. A fine purchase. Well done."
Soon-young had paid rather dearly for the factory, but Ki-jo was convinced that in the long view the deal was pure gain. The land would leap in value, of course, and the plant itself was competitive. If in time they could turn out caramel and biscuits and even make Choco Pie, the company could grow into something considerable. He thought he ought to give them the idea for Choco Pie one day. Korea's confectionery market was bound to keep growing alongside a high birth rate, and a single hit like Crown's Sando could put real money in one's hands.
"But why are you asking us to make hardtack?" Soon-young asked. "I hear the other companies already have the military-supply market sewn up."
"There'll be a use for it this summer."
"In summer? Hardtack goes soggy in the summer..."
He could not tell her about a typhoon that had not yet come, so he turned the talk a little.
"Hardtack isn't only for soldiers. We can give it to children who miss their meals. Won't they be going hungry at home over the school break?"
"That's right! If they don't come to school during vacation, they can't even get jajangmyeon! I knew it—that's just like you!"
At the word that hardtack could be handed out to hungry children, Soon-young clapped her hands in delight. Sunrye, hearing that her husband would buy from her sister's company, seemed somewhat reassured, and her expression eased. Even so, she pressed Ma-ryang.
"I know you're busy, but please look after the confectionery plant a little too."
"I'll see to it. Don't you fret."
Soon-young, still displeased that her sister would not trust her, shot back with a pout.
"Unni! All you know how to do is worry about me. You don't trust me! I'm twenty-two already—the age Mother was when she had you!"
"If that's how I seemed, I'm sorry, Soon-young. I only said it because I want things to go well for you..."
When Sunrye spoke so calmly, Soon-young seemed suddenly sorry herself, and softened a little.
"Anyway, Yeongsu and Yeongeun won't have to worry about sweets, not with an aunt who owns a confectionery plant. I'll always keep the house stocked so you never run out!"
She smiled shyly at her sister, as if asking to make peace.
"All right. You're a company president now, so look after your people too."
"I've watched plenty of how he does things. I'm confident. I'll show them a woman can run a company just as well."
Soon-young had declared her ambition, and Ki-jo was proud that she had bought one of Yongsan's seven confectionery plants and become its mistress. She had bought the company that would be the brightest star among the confectioneries of Yongsan. With Tongyang gone elsewhere, the only firm left in Yongsan to compete with her was Haitai Confectionery. Lotte would enter Korea in '67 and settle in Galwol-dong, but confectionery alone would never let Lotte overwhelm Soon-young's company. More formidable for the moment than the Lotte of the future was Crown Confectionery, already planted in Jungnim-dong.
He remembered the sweet smell of Sando drifting from the Crown plant in Muk-dong in the 1980s. Wondering what on earth it was, he had once stood a good while in the street, looking about.
With the second measure against Typhoon Agnes wrapped up, Ki-jo began to lay the third. He headed first for the Hangang Footbridge, where Hyundai Construction was in the thick of the work. Hyundai, which had broken ground on the restoration in January 1957, was pushing the job with every kind of heavy equipment, helped by Cheongsan Heavy Equipment.
Meeting Chung Ju-yung on the site, Ki-jo talked over the construction.
"President Chung, how far ahead do you think the schedule can be brought?"
"Hard to say. At the start we meant to finish by May of next year. But Cheongsan has backed us with so much equipment, I think we can wrap it up within October of this year."
"I'm sorry to ask, but Cheongsan Construction may need to take a few of the machines this summer. Would that be all right?"
"Oh? Did Cheongsan land a contract? There hasn't been any government work... Did you pick up an American army job?"
"No. I just have a use for them."
"Now, if you're not using construction equipment on a construction job, what are you using it for? Ha ha."
You might fool a ghost, but how did one fool Chung Ju-yung? Ki-jo decided to speak plainly.
"The truth is, when a typhoon comes in summer, the southern provinces take heavy damage, don't they? I'm thinking of moving equipment south ahead of time, to be ready for that."
"Oho!"
Chung Ju-yung's eyes went wide.
"President Lee, you really do have a sharp head on you. Shift the equipment south first, then scoop up the restoration contracts—that's the idea, isn't it?"
"Ah... well, something like that."
Ki-jo let him keep the misunderstanding.
"Ha ha ha! I fancy myself pretty sharp when it comes to making money, but you're no pushover either, President Lee. The river swells in summer anyway, and bridge work gets difficult, so we'll be taking it easy. Use the equipment as much as you like."
"No, no. If you'll draw up a list of the essential machines, I'll leave those and move the rest."
"All right. I'll send the list."
"Thank you, President Chung."
"Aigo, what's there to thank me for? How much time have we already shaved off thanks to Cheongsan Heavy Equipment? In construction, time is money. Money. Shorten the schedule and the profit just swells. Ha ha ha."
Chung Ju-yung clapped Ki-jo's shoulder with a hand like a cauldron lid.
Ki-jo looked out at the Hangang Footbridge, of which only a single lane had been restored. Hyundai Construction and Cheongsan Heavy Equipment were widening it to four. Once the work was finished, crossing from the north bank to Yeongdeungpo would no longer require the pontoon bridge. Gazing at the span that had cut his second life short before his very eyes, he was swept by old feeling. The restoration was being carried out through his equity stake in Hyundai Construction, and yet the Hangang Footbridge held a meaning for him that ran very deep.
Just as the preparations for Typhoon Agnes were drawing at last toward their close, the news he had been waiting for arrived.