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  IDEAS & IDEALS

A Haunted Office

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A female professor in the Home Economics Department in our college died of cancer two weeks ago at the age of fifty-five. She had ten more years to go before her retirement. Her death was a surprise to us all because she made her illness a secret, and none of us, even the colleagues in the same department, did not know that she was so gravely ill. We all went to her funeral and mourned her untimely passing. My sorrow was particular because her office was and still is located right next to mine, and as regular office-comers and tenacious office-occupiers, we had met with each other at least once everyday and exchanged greetings for the past twenty or more years. Her office stands untouched with all her belongings in it yet. Often I forget the sad fact of her absence, and think and act as if she is still there.

      The rumor that her office is haunted came first from one of the cleaning women a few days after her funeral. The office cleaner who was well aware of the professor's death entered the office and began her morning cleaning as usual, when she was addressed by a familiar voice from behind. Feeling somewhat strange, she turned and there she saw the departed professor stand in her usual but somewhat sad and worried appearance. When she tried to say something as a response, she, the apparition, disappeared. Terrified, she rushed to me and told what had happened. I pacified her by saying that the good professor's sudden death must have lain heavy on her. Anyway, she said she would not go in there anymore even for the world.

      What I mind is not the ghost, but the sad fact that the late professor did not have time over her things before she passed away, and left everything behind she had used, loved, and cherished so much and so long during her life in the hands of the indifferent and uncaring people. They would come any day, rummage around in her office, pack some of her personal belongings into carton boxes and carry them in a rented pick-up truck to nowhere. Her ghost, if there be one, would be very sorry for the relentless violation of her privacy. That is why, I think, she is still lingering there.

      For those whose dream is to become a professor in a university to be given an office is the very consummation of their ambition and arduous endeavors. To be a professor in Korea means, in a sense, to have an office of his or her own use in addition to the monthly salary. Once they get the job, a small office is assigned to each of them by the school administration and they usually keep it to themselves until they retire decades later. They rarely share it with others. The period of occupation is generally far longer than that of other office holders in other fields, spanning from twenty-five to thirty years. No wonder if anyone who has lived in and with one fixed placer so long in his life, and who, as a result, has nourished so much affection for and attachment to it, should come to it after death, seen or unseen, for a while before leaving for his final destination.

      Every semester professors retire from the university, and they have to vacate their office. According to my long experience and observation, however, despite their high intelligence and profound scholarship, they do not always succeed in vacating their office in good time at the end of their long and successful career. As a result of long occupation, the office has lost its original meaning long before, and it has become something like a personal property for them. They become suddenly low-spirited, ill-tempered, and sulky before the official notice from the administration that they must leave their office by the end of the semester. For a professor to lose his office is not to lose his workplace only; it is a forfeiture of all his privileges: a study, a library, a communication center, a port of call, a haven, a sanctuary. With the loss of his office, he loses his identity as a professor and becomes a nonentity. He hesitates, mourns, laments, agonizes, and silently wails before the unavoidable decree.

      Large or small, shabby or luxurious, offices exist mainly for the people to work in, but more often than not, the allotted space is not only a workplace for the persons who occupy it; it is also a social symbol of status, success, authority, and even power. The more one becomes successful in the world, the better and larger office is given to him. Executives in the business companies are distinguished from the ordinary salaried workmen, more than anything else, by the size and location of their offices in the building. The office of university's president is not the same one as mine. We cannot separate George W. Bush from his Oval Office at the White House, nor can we imagine President Kim Dae-jung without his pompous office at the Blue House. Worldly successes of a man can be defined in many and various ways, and the magnitude and magnificence of the office the man occupies are the one.  

      For unknown and unclear reasons, some professors employs the tactics of delay. They put off the date of moving out of their office, skipping the winter or the summer vacation, the great moving season in the university, until the new semester begins. Vaguely they hope and expect that the administration would make an exception of their case because they think they are so exceptional. They cling to their office, even after their retirement.

      But this tactics of delay creates an awkward situation on the other part. The person who is moving in is not a complete stranger to the place. He is usually the next senior professor in the same department, an old colleague and friend of the present occupier, who has been keeping his sharp eyes on the office for so many years, because it is larger than his and commands better view. Now his turn has finally come, but the old owner does not show any sign of budging. He is angry, impatient, and desperate. He tries to send his strong message by all means, but all in vain. The retired professor is said to have gone abroad to attend a seminar. And the new semester has already begun.

     Often the school authorities intervene. One day some rough-faced men sent by the administration arrive and crack open the door of the office, (usually the former occupier disappears with the key), and remove all the things in it out, and pile them up on the hallway. People coming and going by this mountain of garbages can enjoy and appreciate an unexpected special exhibition of the ugly and pathetic remains of man's sad and endless desire.  

      I have been myself an occupier of a small office in a university for the past twenty and more years, and now I am thinking of leaving it, for my retirement is just a few years away. I know it takes just a day or two to vacate my office, but I think it is very mean of me to leave such a dear and beloved place in my life in such a hurry and haste, as if I flee from something I hate or fear. The reason I busy myself in this matter of vacating my office so early is to have enough time for me to make it smooth, elegant and graceful at the end of my career. Anything to be well done, even a moving or a leave-taking, should be done with time. And, the lesson I learned from my next-door colleague is that I should be prepared to leave my office without any regret or concern at any time, so that I do not feel the need to come back to it again, and not frighten an innocent cleaning woman.  
      (July 16, 2002)

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