The interview was scheduled on a Wednesday afternoon in Tsinghua University, where Prof. Kim was working as an a visiting scholar. He is a professor of mathematics from South Korea.
On 3:00 pm, I arrived at the west gate of Tsinghua University. On the way Prof. Kim led me to his office, we passed by a big lotus pond. At that time, the blossom season of lotus had gone with the weather of July. There were only green leaves left in the pond. Suddenly, Prof. Kim said to me: “Isn’t that lotus pond very beautiful?”I nodded.Prof. Kim went on, “That is what Zhu Ziqing described in his famous essay The Lotus Pond under Moonlight.”“Wow, the essay is very famous in China. Do you like that?”“Of course, it is great.”
Frankly speaking, I was surprised. The Lotus Pond under Moonlight was written with high skills of having a good command of Chinese language. For those whose native language is not Chinese, the essay is a text to its meaning, not to mention appreciating its beauty in obscurity and nuance. So it seems that Prof. Kim is quite good at Chinese.
My guess proved right immediately. Prof. Kim talked with me in Chinese. Though his pronunciation was not absolutely accurate, his Chinese was indeed very good. I applauded him sincerely, but he just said his Chinese was not good enough, and there was still large space for further improvement. And he agreed with me that the more you learn, the more you find you need to learn. Learning Chinese is an endless challenge.
As our interview began, Prof. Kim talked more about his experiences of learning Chinese and how he thought of China and Chinese cultures. I was surprised again that Prof. Kim was so familiar with China and Chinese cultures. He talked about Chinese ancient dynasties such as Tang, Song, Ming and Qing. He said he had read the Four Great Chinese Novels in his school days, say,Dream of Red Mansion, Romance of three kingdoms, Journey to the west, and Outlawed brothers. He told me nearly everyone in South Korea might have read these four books.
Though he admires ancient Chinese cultures very much and admits Korean cultures are deeply influenced by ancient Chinese cultures, Prof. Kim insists his country has developed its own cultures and features. He seemed to take great pride in it. Through the interview, I felt Prof. Kim is a patriotic man. He had a deep love for his motherland, and he was willing to introduce his motherland to others.
As the interview proceeded, we came to a sensitive topic, the preservation of cultural and historic relics in China. Prof. Kim said he was quite disappointed to see that the Chinese administration was doing a bad job in preserving historic heritages. It is a bitter fact that heritages reminiscent of the glory of ancient Chinese history and cultures are now gradually disappearing in the course of modernization process. Prof. Kim is a Korean, but he is more concerned for traditional Chinese cultures than some Chinese people.
He talked a lot on this topic. Then to ease off the disturbed mood, we jumped to a relaxing topic. Prof. Kim was very proud that he was capable of enjoying his life in China immediately after he arrived. He had not problem communicating with others. Sometimes he traveled alone to other places in China. He got a lot of fun from it. When I quoted a Chinese idiom to compare his life in China to that of fish in water, free and comfortable. he burst into laughter, and he used another idiom to describe his life in China as comfortable as being at home.
Finally the interview came to an end. Prof. Kim told me he was going back to South Korea on Saturday. Living in China has left him nice memories. He wants to come back in the next summer, maybe in time to see the blossom of lotus.
