“Mi-suk! Come to eat strawberries.”
“Mi-suk! Corns are so delicious. I’ll steam them. Come and eat.”
“Mi-suk! I went to the hills and picked some salad plants and spring herbs. They are so delicious. Come to eat.”
My oldest sister calls me whenever she has something to eat. My siblings are six, and the oldest sister knows how busy I am. Despite that, if she has something delicious, she never misses to call me.
She has two large refrigerators and two kimchi refrigerators. A total of four refrigerators are standing side by side in her living room. After her youngest son joined the army, just the two, my sister and her husband, are at home. So it seems that they would not need that many fridges. But actually she shares kimchi with her younger siblings who come from the U.S. once a year as well as another younger sister living in Seoul. That is how her fridges increased in number.
The fridges are always full of things she has raised in a small farm such as corns, peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, and a variety of vegetables. She stored them all for her younger siblings. She always says, “It’s a hard job. I’ll stop doing this,” but she keeps doing it as it weighs on her mind if she cannot give something to one of her younger siblings. She does all these things on behalf of our mother who is too old to do that, even though no one appreciates her efforts. She takes it as her destiny just because she is the first-born.
One day, she slightly opened her mind, saying, “I wish to have someone who takes care of me.” Hearing that, I decided to pay attention to her, but that didn’t last long.
Before it is too late, I want to be her good younger sister. Since I have been given such overflowing love from my sister on behalf of my mother, I too will equally convey my mother’s love to her.