On Line 6 of the Seoul Metro heading from the World Cup Stadium
back towards the suburban area near Janghanpyeong Station, a chubby toddler in
a blue vest with smart spiky hair sits opposite me, playing with the fingers of
his young mother’s spare hand as she toys with her smart phone with the other.
The clean, grey and white-coloured carriage is about two-thirds empty, the
cooled air adding comfort to the journey.
I decided to spend the rest of my time in South Korea in Seoul. On the morning of the day of the train journey described above, I had been to the
former Seodaemun Prison, now a testimony to the brutality of the oppression of
Japanese security forces during Korea’s period of colonial subordination from
1910-1945. The prison’s red-brick walls and outhouses provide contrast to the nearby light grey high-rise apartment buildings that are so characteristic of modern
Korean cities.
The displays inside the prison offer proof of the fact that North-East
Asia, like everywhere else in the world, has in its past experienced human beings treating each other in a manner anything but humane.
It was perhaps because of this that I was in a ponderous mood
as I walked around the outside of the World Cup Stadium later the same day. A
wedding banquet hall and a cinema have been added to the stadium complex since
its heyday as a major venue for the 2002 FIFA World Cup. “Seoul World Cup
Stadium” is displayed proudly in large block capitals on the side of the
stadium facing the exit from the metro station that serves it.
Inside the metro station, there is a set of commemorative
photographs on one of the walls near the barriers. The pictures show the area
in front of the stadium turned into a meadow of red shirts, the words “Seoul
World Cup Stadium” standing proud, then as now, on the outside of the structure
behind them. Other pictures show a various memorable images from the tournament: a young Park Ji-Sung; action from South
Korea’s round of 16 and quarter-final ties; and City Hall surrounded by fans. Draped across the front of City Hall is another, huge, banner: “Korea Welcomes the World”.
