Sokcheok Village, though the things he had heard about it implied otherwise, came as a pleasant surprise to Xiajun.
Children ran about in open fields, poking each other with twigs and laughing around, oblivious to all the grisly recent events. Women chastised their kids from afar, standing near a row of huts and wooden houses. Men worked away with their tractors in the nearby corn fields while cattle grazed on grasslands not too far away.
The atmosphere was so calm and pure that Xiajun had trouble understanding how the people looked so much at peace when they knew others amidst them were killing themselves.
Xiajun parked his car under the shade of a large tree and got out, Miss Rong following suit.
"Welcome," said Miss Rong as her eyes swept the landscape, "to Sokcheok Village. The weather is especially nice today." And it was indeed. The sun shone high in the sky, though it didn't sting the eyes, and the trees swayed slowly from side to side.
