184 Chapter 8Vasilevich Pak, who gave us a wonderful interview about his deportation
from the RFE. Pak had been born in 1923 and thus was fourteen at the
time of his deportation— old enough to remember school, how he felt, what
life and relations were like in their fishing kolkhoz and with the Rus sians
and Chinese of the RFE.^16
Pak had been an accountant at Kolkhoz Uzbekistan since 1952. He
conveyed to us new information about salaries, the year the first Soviet cars
were available to individuals, and how much kolkhoz chairmen, head ac-
countants, and tractorists earned (350, 350, and 400 rubles respectively in
the mid-1960s through the 1970s).^17 (The pay for a tractorist seemed to support
the Leninist euphemism of “dictatorship of the proletariat,” as the driver/
mechanic was the first at Kolkhoz Uzbekistan to buy his own car in 1965.)
As we finished Pak’s interview, the four of us went outside so that Nikolai
could smoke. The mid- September sun was beginning to set. It was still hot,
around 34–36 Celsius, but now there was a breeze. Pak began to tell new and
further revelatory stories about how Koreans had managed to serve at the
front during the Second World War. We were all amazed at his ability to
recall and recount the past with such detail and dry wit. We had arrived at
Pak’s home around 3:30 p.m., and it was now about 6:30 or 7:00 p.m. It was
clearly time to go. I was beginning to think wistfully about the adventures
that I had shared with Sasha (Aleksandr) and Larisa, because I knew that
this pro cess of interviews was almost over (I had already spent four years
interviewing Korean deportees). I remembered interviewing in the middle
of chillah (the hottest period of summer from mid- June to mid- August in
Uzbekistan) where temperatures rose above 42 Celsius. It was even hotter
inside a house without air conditioning (I am referring to Raisa Nigai’s
home and the hospitality of fresh grapes from their garden and hot scalding
tea— U zbek style). All of these experiences and our camaraderie were near-
ing their conclusion.
Nikolai Pak finished his last story. I turned off the recorder and the
video camera. Then I began to pack up all of my equipment. Perfunctorily, I
asked him, “Is there anything else you would like to add?” I was checking
for the possibility of one last great story. But in real ity I wanted to leave, as
I was swayed by the comfort of the setting sun and a light breeze (autumn
was approaching hot Uzbekistan). Then Nikolai began:
We had a man [a Korean] from this kolkhoz. He was regarded by the
NKVD as “unreliable.” So around 1939 or 1940, he was sentenced to serve
in a gulag in northern Siberia. He got there and his only thought was
survival. As you may know, the Chinese were often the cooks at the gulag
camps. Because he was a Korean, he was offered a job cooking with the