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Why It Sucks to Be a Wedding Gift Girl (in Joseon Korea) — Transcript

by Backstory Of History · 2,948 words · 417 segments · language en-US · Watch on YouTube

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0:00Your thumb is bleeding into a wedding
0:01jacket. Your eyes sting, but you keep
0:04stitching because the bride, Hayok, gets
0:07married in three days. Her father stops
0:09in the doorway with a paper and reads it
0:11out in front of the maids. Hayok's
0:14dowry, but she takes to her husband's
0:16house. He looks at you. Bondwoman Dyaki,
0:2021. She's dressed you since you could
0:23walk. Hayak looks up. Not the
0:25riverfield. The riverfield stays with
0:27your brothers, he says. A bride with no
0:30girl of her own looks poor. A girl costs
0:32me less than a field. Then he reads the
0:34rest of your line. Born of a bond woman
0:37of this house. He looks at you. Your
0:41mother was our slave. So you are our
0:43slave. That's why you're mine to give.
0:46Isn't that right? Everyone waits. Your
0:48mouth is dry. Yes, sir. My mother was
0:50yours, so I am yours. You mean it.
0:53Hayyaki takes the needle out of your
0:55hand, rips a piece off her own sleeve,
0:57and binds your thumb.
0:59Don't bleed on it. It's the only one
1:01I've got. You're not going to the
1:03wedding. You are the wedding gift. 3
1:06days later, your fingers are tying the
1:08last knot on Hayok's jacket when the
1:10clerk calls the line. Everyone Hayok's
1:12father owns stands in rows in the
1:14courtyard. The clerk sits at a low table
1:16and reads Hiok's share out loud. A rice
1:19field by the east stream with its size
1:22and its name. A dry field on the hill.
1:25Then you bondwoman Diaki 21. Then a set
1:29of brass bowls. You're listed before the
1:31bowls.
1:33That's something. Some land, some brass,
1:36some people. The riverfield isn't on it.
1:38The word for what you are now is
1:40Gaiojoni.
1:42The one who walks in front of the
1:44palenquin. When your name is read,
1:46you're supposed to step forward. Your
1:48legs don't move. The clerk reads it
1:51again. Hayak's father takes the pipe out
1:54of his mouth. Then Hayok says your name
1:56softly from the veranda. Your feet move.
1:59The clerk makes one stroke with his
2:01brush and you belong to Hi Ook and to
2:03her husband's house. An hour later, a
2:06red palenquin carries Haok out through
2:08the gate. You walk in front of it. Her
2:11closed chest in your arms. Your chest is
2:13tight. You were born in that courtyard.
2:16Nobody says when you'll see it again.
2:18Your knees find the frost before
2:20anything else does. The husband's house
2:22is bigger and colder. His father, the
2:25old master, owns it. His mother, Haya's
2:28mother-in-law, runs it. Haya, sleeps in
2:31the inner rooms. You sleep in the gate
2:34rooms by the stable with the laundry
2:36girls on a floor. The fire never
2:38reaches. Nobody explains the rules. You
2:42find each one by breaking it. Your first
2:44morning, the mother-in-law asks Haya a
2:46question, and you answer it. A bond
2:49woman doesn't speak before her mistress.
2:51The mother-in-law hits you across the
2:53mouth with the back of her hand, and her
2:54ring splits your lip. You taste blood
2:57for 2 days. That night, you sleep across
3:00Hayok's doorway, as you did at home.
3:03Here, bond women are out of the inner
3:05rooms before the lamps go out. The
3:07mother-in-law has you kneel on the
3:09frozen yard stones until dawn, your
3:11knees split open. All winter, you take
3:14the stairs sideways. At home, you ate
3:17from Hayak's tray. when she was done
3:20here. Leftovers go down by rank and your
3:23last. You eat from Hayak's tray. Anyway,
3:27the laundry girls report you. No rice
3:30for 3 days. On the third day, you faint
3:33carrying water and wake up with the
3:35bucket handle still in your fist. At
3:37home, you gave the laundry girls orders.
3:40Here, they give you orders. They're
3:43thrilled to have you. You're someone new
3:45to be above. The house calls it keeping
3:48order. Your mouth calls it the taste of
3:50blood. Then there's the stable hand who
3:52brushes down the old master's horse
3:54every morning. He has the old master's
3:56jaw and the old master's walk. His
3:59mother was a bond woman here. And every
4:02morning the old master walks right past
4:04him without once saying his name. His
4:06mother was theirs, so he is theirs.
4:10You said so. You meant it. So where is
4:13his father? In a few years, your own
4:15body answers that for you. 5 years
4:17later, in the summer of 1724, your knees
4:20have stopped aching, and the news comes
4:22up the road with the salt cellar. The
4:24old king is dead. The new king's mother
4:27was a woman the palace called Sukbin.
4:29She first came into the palace walking
4:31in front of a queen's palenquin, a
4:33brides girl, just like you. Now her son
4:36is the king. It moves through the gate
4:38rooms like contraband. The laundry girls
4:40whisper it at the well. You whisper it
4:43back. If a bride's girl can raise a
4:45king, then the list with your name on it
4:47is not the end of you. That autumn Hayak
4:49has a daughter and hands the baby
4:51straight to you. First, in front of the
4:54mother-in-law.
4:55Hold her, she says. She should know your
4:58face. That night, Hayank makes you a
5:01promise.
5:02The day she marries, I'll ask my husband
5:05for your paper. You work it out in the
5:06dark. 20 years, give or take. You'll be
5:1046. You can wait 20 years. You've waited
5:13your whole life without a date. So, you
5:16start doing things that only make sense
5:18if there's a future. You save the good
5:20thread from Haya Ox mending a little
5:22each month and hide it in your pillow
5:24for her daughter's wedding jacket. 20
5:27years early, then the stable hand tells
5:29you his secret. For 11 years, he's been
5:32saving to buy his own paper. He belongs
5:34to the husband now, part of the
5:36husband's share. He has the money. He
5:39has no one to ask. You have Haya. A year
5:42ago, you'd never have risked it. You ask
5:44Hayak. Hayak asks her husband. He signs.
5:48The stable hand walks out the front
5:49gate. A free man with his paper inside
5:51his shirt. The next morning, the
5:53mother-in-law sends you to the woodshed
5:55to cut your own switch. The Greenwood
5:58fights your knife. It takes you three
6:00tries. The charges come in words nobody
6:03has ever used about you. meddling,
6:06insolence, disloyalty to the house, the
6:08whole compound stands in the yard to
6:10watch. She makes you hold up the hem of
6:12your own skirt and count the strokes out
6:14loud. The switch comes down across the
6:17backs of your bare calves. At 12, the
6:20skin opens. By 20, there's blood in your
6:22socks and the laundry girls are studying
6:24the wall. You let my husband's shame
6:26walk out of here, the mother-in-law says
6:29with a free man's paper in his shirt.
6:31That's when you understand what you did.
6:33The stable hand is the old master's son.
6:36Everyone knew. Nobody said. And near the
6:39end, you understand something else.
6:41Hayak could ask her husband for one
6:44favor.
6:45One.
6:47You spent it on him. You could have
6:49asked for your own paper that night. If
6:52you had, he'd still be brushing horses.
6:55Standing here was a choice.
6:58You just didn't know you were making it.
7:00Your calves carry the house's rules now,
7:02written in raised red lines. The old
7:04master decided the stable hand followed
7:06his mother, so he'd never owe that boy a
7:08thing. That rule didn't come from
7:11heaven. It came from men who father
7:13children and don't want to pay for them.
7:15For 3 days, you burn with fever, and the
7:18welts weep through the bandages.
7:20The mother-in-law says that when you can
7:22stand, you'll get 20 more. On the fourth
7:25day, you stand. She sends for the
7:27switch. The husband takes it out of her
7:29hand. He does it in front of the
7:30servants, which a son never does to his
7:32mother. She goes inside without a word.
7:36He sends to town for a physician's
7:38plaster and pays for it himself. Then he
7:40kneels by your bedding to make sure it
7:42goes on right. A man of his rank on his
7:45knees in the gate rooms. The fever
7:47breaks. Hayok sits with you and feeds
7:49you porridge with a spoon, the way you
7:51once fed her. By the new year, you can
7:54walk without limping. You go back to
7:56your sum 19 years to the wedding. Then
7:59the husband and Hayok talk in the
8:01courtyard where you can't hear.
8:03Afterwards, Hayok says only it's
8:06settled. That week, the husband asks
8:08after your legs by name twice.
8:12When you thank him, he doesn't want
8:14thanks.
8:15He wants you to keep standing there.
8:17From tonight, you sleep in my husband's
8:19side room. Haya tells you 5 years
8:22married, one daughter, and the
8:24mother-in-law wants a concubine brought
8:26in from outside. A stranger would be a
8:29rival. You're hers. Better you, Hayak
8:33says, than someone she can't control.
8:35You think about refusing. Then you think
8:38about the switch still in the woodshed.
8:40Refuse him. And nobody stands between
8:43that switch and your legs. That night,
8:45you go to the side room. You open your
8:47mouth once and nothing comes out.
8:50In the morning, Hayok ties your jacket
8:52strings for you with her eyes on the
8:54knot. I belong to Hayok, you tell him
8:57the next night. It's written. And Hayak
9:01belongs to me. The house calls it a
9:03kindness.
9:04At the next household count, the clerk
9:06adds one word beside your name.
9:08Concubine. Your arms ache from the wine
9:10jars. In 1726, you give birth to a girl
9:14with the husband's eyebrows, and you
9:16name her Bach Eye. It means luck because
9:19you're the husband's now. You carry his
9:21wine into the men's quarters. You pour
9:23eyes down and hear everything. A guest
9:26describes his grandfather's house
9:27dividing its people. Seven children and
9:30a stepmother.
9:3119 bond people all on one sheet. Some
9:34were set aside only to sweep the family
9:36graves. The paper counts people in a
9:39word it uses for nothing else. Bodies.
9:42The husband's elder brother says at
9:44dinner that free and base must never
9:47mix. Then he leaves the table for a
9:49bondwoman's room. The old master kneels
9:51at the rights every autumn and prays for
9:53his sons, all but one. Every big house
9:56on this road has a child in the gate
9:58rooms with its owner's face. Aayak says
10:00nothing because a rival she owns can
10:02never replace her. The mother-in-law
10:05says nothing because it's easier to
10:07blame you than her son. The laundry
10:09girls say nothing because any one of
10:11them could be next. They argue about the
10:13law. In 1669, the court decided that a
10:16bond man's children by a free wife would
10:19be born free. Then another faction took
10:21the court and changed it back and back
10:24again. The men argue as if it's about
10:26fairness. It's about who gets the
10:28children. Before 1669, a bondman's child
10:31by a free woman was a slave because its
10:33father was. A bond woman's child by a
10:36free man was a slave because its mother
10:38was. A child follows whichever parent
10:40makes it property. The owners decide
10:42which. Three winters of carrying wine.
10:45Then in the spring of 1729, the old
10:48master dies. The morning after the old
10:50master's funeral, the old ridges on your
10:52calves ache and there's no rain. The
10:54clerk is back. Grayer now at a low table
10:57in the main hall. The family sits in a
11:00half circle to divide the property. It's
11:03called a meeting of agreement. Everyone
11:06who owns something agrees.
11:08Everyone who is something kneels in the
11:11yard. You kneel with Baky on your hip.
11:13She's three. The mother-in-law points at
11:16her. Another child with this family's
11:18face in my gate rooms. That's the
11:20charge. Not something you did, something
11:22you had. The side room goes first. It'll
11:25store the right vessels now. Then your
11:27place at Hawk's side. From now on, a
11:29laundry girl will dress her. You reach
11:31for Hayak's sleeve, the one she tore for
11:33your thumb 10 years ago. She takes it
11:36back. The king's own mother walked in
11:38front of a palenquin. You say the king
11:41follows his father. The mother-in-law
11:43says in this house, a child follows its
11:46mother. So you look at the husband. He
11:48took the switch out of her hand once. He
11:50says it the way you'd mentioned the
11:51weather.
11:53She follows her mother. The clerk wets
11:55his brush. Bond girl Baky three born of
11:59the bondwoman. Daki, she goes to Haya
12:02Aok's daughter's share for her wedding.
12:05You believed Bakai was the one thing
12:06that made you impossible to throw away.
12:10She's the husband's blood.
12:12She turns out to be the next wedding
12:14gift. The day she marries, Hayok
12:17promised. 15 years left. Same day. It
12:21just means something else now. Whose is
12:23the child? They ask his, you say. They
12:26ask again. His. Then the mother-in-law
12:29mentions a buyer down the valley. So you
12:32say it, "Hi, Ox daughters."
12:35Not because it's true, because truth is
12:38no use in this hall and Bakai would pay
12:40for it. Somebody calls for wine. The
12:42wine you used to carry. The
12:44mother-in-law gives her ruling base.
12:47Gate rooms dowry. The first two are for
12:50you. The last is for Bakai. Baky has a
12:53line on the dowy list now. Written down
12:55the way your calves were. Not his
12:57daughter, just yours. Your fingers crack
12:59in the laundry water all winter, and
13:01nobody here asks about your legs. The
13:03house doesn't punish you anymore. It
13:06doesn't notice you. That's harder than
13:08the switch. The switch ended. Now
13:11there's only one thing you want.
13:13Buckeye's paper. The stable hand bought
13:16his. It took him 11 years. You have 15.
13:20By day, you boil the cattle feed and
13:22haul the laundry. At night, you do fine
13:24needle work by the stove, the kind
13:26nobody else in the gate rooms can do.
13:28The stable hand is a free man in the
13:30village now. He sells your work at the
13:32market and keeps your coins in a jar
13:34under his floor. He never takes a cut.
13:38He remembers who asked for his paper.
13:40You teach Buckeye while you work, how to
13:43hold a needle so it doesn't slip, how to
13:45keep her face still when the
13:47mother-in-law walks by, and how to stand
13:49at the very back of any line in the yard
13:52where the clerk's eyes never reach. One
13:54night, she asks why you work so late.
13:56"Nobody hands you over alone," you tell
13:58her. She's four. She doesn't understand
14:01it. She says it back to you anyway.
14:04Every night, like a song, Bucky turns
14:06five. The jar under the stable hands
14:08floor gets heavier. In 1731, the news
14:11comes up the road again, and your heart
14:13pounds before you understand it. The
14:15king has settled the law about mothers
14:17forever. A bondman's children by a free
14:20wife are born free, and no faction will
14:22ever change it back. No more owners
14:25marrying their bondman to free girls to
14:27breed property. The capital is very
14:29pleased with itself, and the king who
14:31signed it is Sukbin's son, a bride's
14:35girl's son. You think Buckyy's father is
14:37free. Surely this is for her. You walk
14:40into the inner courtyard for the first
14:41time in 2 years. Hayak comes out to meet
14:44you. She says your name. She hasn't said
14:47it since the hall. She takes you herself
14:50to the clerk who is writing letters in
14:51the men's quarters. He hears you out.
14:53He's polite. The law frees a bondman's
14:55children by a free wife. Her mother is
14:58the bond woman. She stays. Hayog nods as
15:01if she knew. Then she goes back inside
15:04and she doesn't say your name again. The
15:06law changed for children whose father
15:07was owned. For children whose mother was
15:10owned, it changed nothing. In the spring
15:13of 1744, you're 46. The night before the
15:16wedding, Bakai's thumb is bleeding into
15:19a wedding jacket. Um, Hayak's daughter's
15:21jacket. Baky is 18. She stitched the
15:24last sleeve too fast. You rip a piece
15:26off your own sleeve and tie it around
15:28her thumb. Last month you carried the
15:30stable hands jar to Hayok.
15:3315 years of needle work. She didn't even
15:36open it.
15:38She's already on the list. She said in
15:41the morning the clerk reads the list in
15:43the courtyard. Bakkeye stands at the
15:46very back the way you taught her. It
15:48doesn't help. He reads her name anyway
15:51between a field and a chest of bedding.
15:53You step out of your row. You kneel in
15:56front of Hayach on the stones and ask
15:59her to write your name, too. The
16:00mother-in-law laughs, an old bond woman
16:04sent as a wedding gift. Hayak looks at
16:06you a long time. Then she tells the
16:09clerk, "Write her. A red palenquin goes
16:12out through the gate. Two women walk in
16:14front of it, carrying the bride's chest
16:16between them. 25 years ago, you walked
16:19in front of a palenquin alone. Nobody
16:21hands your daughter over alone. Not
16:23while you can still walk. If you think a
16:25bride's girl had it rough, at least she
16:27kept her daughter in sight. A wet nurse
16:30didn't get that. In Josion, Korea, a
16:32bond woman who had just given birth
16:34could be ordered to feed her owner's
16:35baby instead of her own. Her child
16:38wasn't taken by a list. It was taken by
16:40her own milk. That's a different kind of
16:42trap and it's the next

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