I’ve Grown Interested in Saving People
"Honestly, after that gentleman saved all those people, I couldn't help but think about how much I was getting in salary and incentives."
"Ah, what kind of..."
"Well, when the office workers come by, we usually chat while having a smoke, but would you believe it? They said that because he handled that accident so well, we ended up winning orders for dozens of ships from China. I clocked out at 1:00 AM yesterday. Even with all that overtime, I didn't feel tired at all."
"..."
"My eldest is heading to college soon, and I was really worried about the tuition... but do you know how much I got paid last month? A cool 11.5 million won hit my account. After taxes. How much did you get, Foreman?"
"Since you've got more seniority, you'd get more, Hyung-nim. I got 8.7 million."
That was a lot. A significantly large amount.
"But it's not just because of the money that the guy is great."
"..."
"I thought, 'He’s just some guy scribbling with a pen at a desk, what could he possibly do with us? He wouldn't know the hearts of people who live by their sweat every day.' We thought that way. What were we doing back then?"
"We were rolling around the dock when we got the call and went. On a tour bus. Foreman, you were cursing up a storm, saying, 'Is this General Manager bastard calling us to take pictures or put on a show?'... Hahaha!"
"People like us who live off the sea can't help but think that way, Mr. Prime Minister."
"Then why..." asked the Minister of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, who had been listening quietly from the side.
"Like this, I thought I was just going to take a picture. I thought he was dragging 40-year-old laborers out to act like he cared about them. But to my surprise, the headquarters must be in Seoul, but no matter how I looked at it, it felt like Incheon. That young guy in a sharp, stylish suit saw us and immediately said we had to go, that we should talk after boarding the ship. I was so bewildered that all nine of us just followed him."
"...I see."
"When I asked him what he was trying to do, he was barely holding back his seasickness and said, 'We are going to save a tilting ship... we have to save people.' You know what I thought at that moment? I thought, 'He looks like he's about to die himself, so who is he trying to save?'"
While the other workers pulled out another cigarette each, the foreman continued.
"At first, we wanted to tease that nerd. When we asked what we should do first, the lady standing next to him explained in detail where to tie the ropes, how long it would take, how many people were there, and all that..."
"We couldn't say a word and just walked out. Right, Foreman? All of us, to the deck."
"That's right. And you know what that young guy said?"
— In the middle of the churning sea, on the ship, he only said what was necessary and was busy thinking of ways to get people up quickly. Then, the welding foreman said in a slightly cynical tone, "Why do we have to do this job? We're tired..."
"..."
And at that moment, as if possessed by something, he fixed his gaze somewhere beyond the horizon, staring blankly at the edge of the sea, and said:
"..."
"There has to be a reason for us to work, even if you're paying us for the day..."
"I'm sure you all have children."
"...?"
"In about 30 minutes, we will be near the tilting oil tanker."
"..."
"There will be people there. People around the same age as you, the staff... There will be a young friend there, similar to me. There will be someone's precious son, and a head of a household for whom someone is desperately praying to return home safely."
The people stopped talking and looked at him.
"Perhaps at Incheon Port, where we departed, they are wailing among the reporters, feeling like they want to die, wondering how they will live now. I'm sorry for dragging you here without telling you, but could you please help them?"
"If we turn the ship around here today, that vessel will capsize by 5:00 AM. That's 4 hours left. More oil will spill, and by the day after tomorrow, the fishermen will lose their livelihoods. No more fish will be caught, and the fishermen will fall into endless poverty."
"That's not all. Someone's wife will lose her husband and want to die..."
At that part, he shed a single tear with a blank expression.
"Some child will have to leave the father's spot blank when writing down their family relations in the future. They will become a child without a father, and they will keep waiting... *sob*... for the father who died lonely at sea..."
Some of the staff sitting down began to shed tears as well.
"Someone must have boarded that oil tanker to pay for their elderly mother's hospital bills. Thinking they would definitely get off the ship and take home a large sum of money. Someone boarded it for the food money to send to their family tomorrow. Someone else boarded it to pay for their children's tuition, and someone else to escape the pit of debt. Those people... aren't they pitiful?"
"Is there a reason to save people? The sea is getting dirty, and people are about to die... Just because it has nothing to do with our company, can't we just leave them to die? I thought that if we have the tools to rescue them and the people to do it, it's worth a try, so I came."
Eunbyul also looked at him. She hadn't told him what to say in such a situation, but he continued to speak as if possessed by something, as if possessed by some silent ghost beyond the horizon.
For a while, the workers sat still, staring at the floor in silence. Then, without anyone saying a word, one by one, they slowly stood up and headed to the deck. The last remaining foreman asked:
"...I don't understand. Aren't you a businessman?"
"...?"
"Are you thinking of making money by saving this? I don't see any money in my eyes. Are you trying to get some compensation for saving those people? Or are you trying to attract some attention—"
He listened quietly for a moment, threw out one sentence, and then slowly walked toward the deck.
"I'm not trying to save money. It wasn't my intention, but I've grown interested in saving people."
"..."
"Not doing it when I can seems like a sorry thing to do to someone. ...Let's go together."
"I see."
"You say 'I see,' Mr. Prime Minister, but if you had been there, you wouldn't have reacted like that."
"That's right. Prime Minister, time flew by incredibly fast from that moment on."
Now, there was no time to think that it was an unexpected event. They kept bringing up his contributions, constantly reflecting on them and mentioning them.
"When he asked us to show him how to pull the rope effectively, I just told him to do it the manual labor way."
"..."
"It's hard work even for us, but he wasn't even wearing gloves, tying the rope behind his back and dragging it himself; it was truly pitiful."
"Exactly. The General Manager's hands were covered in wounds back then... oh my."
"And you know what he said to me after that? He shouted at me to go over there and pull someone out. Hahaha, I should have asked him how I was supposed to climb up there when I heard that..."
"..."
"Seeing him do that, I couldn't argue at all. So I did it. That was the first rescue. He seemed to be about my age... he was trembling and crying the whole time. It's not like one man can comfort another man. I threw him onto the passenger ship as quickly as I could."
The Prime Minister and the Minister of Patriots and Veterans Affairs felt an unshakeable doubt as they listened to their words.
'Why, exactly.'
'Why not show it off?'
'It's a tremendous feat.'
'A chaebol heir doing manual labor... after work, in the middle of the night.'
'Why on earth did he do it?'
'What is the reason?'
'He hasn't received any compensation yet.'
'No one even asked for his help.'
The aides behind them, who had been worried that he might get angry and lash out at the Prime Minister, were each sitting on overturned buckets, listening intently to the workers' words. Their expressions and tone sounded as if they were reciting an epic saga.
"I wonder if those people are living well now."
"...They have all been discharged. They returned... to the arms of their families."
"That's good. That General Manager? He would be happy. Was it when we pushed them with the tugboat and were salvaging? He was a guy who smoked, so we had one together."
"..."
"That person said, 'I should have brought a doctor to the passenger ship.' When I heard that, I dropped my cigarette."
"Exactly. He did a great thing, but he didn't boast, and in the middle of all that, he was thinking about a doctor."
"He even tried to go to the passenger ship alone to play some music. Was it music to calm the mind? Seeing that, I found it so funny, I really did."
It seems his thoughtfulness in trying to bring a doctor, considering that the people he rescued would be trembling, left a great impression on them. The foreman went to the passenger ship and touched his cell phone, and he said:
"This is... a song I listen to often."
"...It's nice."
He had even done that.
"And that secretary, that woman, she's also a very smart woman."
"Secretary, hmm... Eunbyul, are you talking about this person?"
"Yes. She came to us and whispered that it was an opportunity to change the company's image. She said if we saved people and won a lot of orders, we could fill our salaries to the brim, and ha... it was tempting."
The foreman, who spoke plainly without any sign of fear of the Prime Minister, thought of Eunbyul.
"The General Manager seems like a good person, but that secretary next to him. That secretary seems clever."
"...."
"She had everyone wrapped around her finger. Making us follow her words... it was like we were possessed by something. Right?"
"Exactly. It's been a while since I've worked so hard that I didn't even think about smoking."