“Yang Gil-su” by Giles Ryan (Korea)
by Giles Ryan (Korea 1970 – 72) When you were a Volunteer did you use your own name in country? Or did you have another name? Every Korea PCV had a Korean name based on a long-standing tradition going back hundreds of years to the earliest Italian foreign missionaries in China, and the Korean language teachers in the training programs simply assumed we each needed a name. The story below draws on this experience in Peace Corps/Korea. Years later, I was married in Korea and my in-laws still call me by this name. • • • Yang-sŏnsaeng We all receive a name at birth and carry this name through life. True, we may have a nickname, but typically this is only a shortened form of our formal name. But imagine, if you will, acquiring an entirely different name at a later time in life, and in a different language, and . . .
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I enjoyed reading this memory! I have always treasured the name I was given on arrival in Korea in 1976:…