Chapter 0
I had a very bad habit of not being able to control my anger since I was a child.
Well, the adults said it was a bad habit, so it must be a bad habit.
Anyway, I was a bad kid with a bad habit.
I was such a bad kid that I punched my dad in the chin when he sarcastically said Santa wouldn’t give me presents on Christmas, so I guess I was a bad kid.
I was only eight years old when I punched my dad in the chin and had to skip dinner as punishment, and I was copying the Bible instead of writing a letter of apology.
My mother was a devout Christian, so whenever I couldn’t control my bad habit, she would force me to sit at my desk and copy the Bible. It was the so-called Bible version of the”ggamji”punishment.
As I was copying the Bible, muttering the curse word I learned from a weekend morning drama, my mother would quietly open the door and come in, leaving a warm glass of milk next to me.
And she would say.
━This is all because Jesus loves you. You understand how Mom feels, right?
Every time she said that, I couldn’t control my anger and would talk back to her.
━Where is Jesus!!!! Santa Claus is the best!!!!!!!!!!
Of course, every time I did that, the amount of”ggamji”I had to write doubled. I remember it going up to 8 times the original amount.
Thanks to that, by the time I entered elementary school, my finger joints were covered in calluses.
So, did my bad habit of getting angry easily go away? I must have gotten better since I was writing”ggamji”all the time, getting scolded, and skipping dinner.
━Teacher! I don’t want to be partners with Siu!
━I don’t want to either, you b*tch!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
━Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!
━Siu! Where did you learn such bad language!!
A girl who looked like a steamed bun swollen with baby fat blatantly”gorosied”me during partner-switching time, so I just retaliated.
The teacher, so unfairly, dragged me to the front of the classroom in front of everyone and put on a humiliation show. She made me pull down my pants and hit my thighs with a whip.
Now, you might be wondering how such an absurd punishment could happen in Korea, which values advanced education and children’s rights.
To cut to the chase, my homeroom teacher was another devout Jesus fan who went to the same church as my mother, and my mother personally granted her the”freedom to punish”me as soon as I was assigned to her class.
So, I was the only SM plaything in this school whose parents condoned it.
Han Siu, the human, learned the bitter taste of the world at the tender age of eight, and returned to his seat, receiving ridicule and pointing from his classmates.
And the moment I faced the girl who wiped away her fake crocodile tears, stuck her tongue out at me, and whispered”serves you right,”I couldn’t control my bad habit again and threw a punch.
So, on the first day of elementary school, I was called to the principal’s office for breaking one of the baby teeth of the sassy girl （I learned that phrase from a morning drama） next to me.
As expected from the people who raised a sassy girl, her sassy parents barged into the principal’s office and raised their voices at me, while my parents kept bowing and apologizing.
In that frustrating space where no one took my side and everyone just yelled at me to apologize, I naturally activated my bad habit.
━What did I do wrong, dammit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Unable to control my anger, I screamed and ran away. I instantly became a runaway ninja, escaping through a hole under the school fence, running past dangerous vehicles, and sprinting through the bustling city.
And I was sitting in an old playground of an old apartment building that was scheduled for demolition soon, frantically digging in the sandbox.
The reason I was digging in the sandbox was nothing special. My hands were too weak to punch anything, and I couldn’t stand still, so I just frantically dug through the sand.
━Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeng!!
After a while of being buried in the sandbox with a face that looked like it was about to explode,
I finally stopped my dirty hands when I felt the damp, hard soil beneath the soft sand.
I’m hungry. If I go home, I’ll have to skip dinner again and write”ggamji,”right? This time, it’s definitely 500 times the original amount.
Then, I just won’t go home, right? D*mn, I’m so smart!
━Oh~ Lord Jesus~ Overflowing with love~
A hymn that got stuck in my head because my mom would always drag me to Sunday morning service after watching weekend morning dramas slipped out.
━Jesus, more beautiful than the fragrant flower of love~
Jesus, who always makes me skip dinner~
Jesus, who always makes me write”ggamji”~
Jesus, who always says I’m the only bad kid~
Santa Claus is still the best. He always left presents by my bedside even though I grew up being called a bad kid.
Even when I had a property dispute with my cousin over my toy robot at my grandparents’ house, the stern judge （my grandfather） always sided with my cousin.
The toy robot that was taken from me last holiday was a meaningful item because Santa Claus gave it to me for Christmas when I was five.
So, I couldn’t control my bad habit and spilled my grandfather’s bowl of”tteokguk”. That’s why I had to write”ggamji”8 times the original amount when my grandfather got burned by the hot”tteokguk”.
Still, I was confident. Just like now.
━Believe in Jesus, go to Heaven; don’t believe, go to H*ll~ Jesus is the best~ Powerful Jesus feeds 5,000 with 3 loaves~
He never helped me in my life, but the only songs I knew were hymns that blindly praised Him, so I had no choice.
While other kids were singing”Baby Shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo,”I was singing hymns all the time.
It was also because my mom only let me sing hymns to get me into the church’s children’s choir.
But I still couldn’t stand being hungry. The still chilly spring got colder as the sky darkened.
If I don’t go home, I won’t get scolded and I won’t have to write”ggamji”, but then I won’t be able to raid the fridge at night for food.
I have to go home to raid the fridge at night!
━I’m letting you off the hook just this once!
Dusting off my hands, I turned around and went back the way I came.
I was smart enough to memorize lines from morning dramas, so I could easily find my way back. Now I can even write”ggamji”without looking at the Bible.
When I got home, I found an empty house.
The warmth of the kitchen where my mom would be preparing dinner, the angry voices of my parents snapping at each other about how they raised their child, the delicious smell of food that I couldn’t eat but could raid the fridge for at night,
None of it was there, only a cold, dark house greeted me.
My parents must be looking for me now, or they might be eating out since they were planning to make me skip dinner anyway.
Thinking that, I went back to my room as usual and wrote”ggamji”from the Bible. I had to write it in advance so I wouldn’t get scolded as much later.
And my parents never came back home, not after a day, not after two days, not even until I graduated from school, hopping from one relative’s house to another.
