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Hyeonseo’s “uncle,” Father’s cousin, and Aunt Sang-hee’s husband. Uncle Jung-gil lives in Shenyang, China, where he defected during the Korean War. When Hyeonseo defects to China from North Korea, she goes to Shenyang to visit Uncle Jung-gil and Aunt Sang-hee. Like Aunt Sang-hee, Uncle Jung-gil welcomes Hyeonseo with open arms, and he offers her a place to live after it becomes clear that she can never go back to North Korea. Uncle Jung-gil wastes little time telling Hyeonseo the truth about North Korea once she arrives in China, and he informs her of several “truths,” like the fact that Kim Jong-il isn’t really a communist and that the Korean War was actually started when the North Koreans invaded South Korea unprovoked, not the other way around, as Hyeonseo has been taught in North Korean schools since she was a child. Hyeonseo listens politely, but she thinks that Uncle Jung-gil is “crazy.” She has never heard anyone disrespect the North Korean government in such a way, and it is several years before she finally realizes that Uncle Jung-gil speaks the truth. The character of Uncle Jung-gil and Hyeonseo’s inability to initially believe his claims underscores the effectiveness of ideological indoctrination by the North Korean government and the power of the Kim regime to condition North Koreans to believe their alternative truths; however, Uncle Jung-gil also represents the importance of family in Korean culture. Uncle Jung-gil hasn’t seen Hyeonseo in years, but he still goes out of his way to help her time and time again, despite the fact aiding North Korean defectors in illegal in China.
Uncle Jung-gil Quotes in The Girl with Seven Names
The The Girl with Seven Names quotes below are all either spoken by Uncle Jung-gil or refer to Uncle Jung-gil. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 20 Quotes
My uncle and aunt made me feel instantly welcome. I was family - it made no difference to them that they had not seen me in years.
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“You know all the history they teach you at school is a lie?” This was his opening shot.
He started counting off the fallacies he said I’d been taught. He said that at the end of the Second World War the Japanese had not been defeated by Kim Il-sung’s military genius. They’d been driven out by the Soviet Red Army, which had installed Kim Il-sung in power. There had been no “Revolution.”
I had never before heard my country being criticized. I thought he’d gone crazy.
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Chapter 33 Quotes
I thought of my uncle’s tirade against North Korea when I’d arrived in his apartment in Shenyang over six years ago, and the bizarre truths he’d told me about the Korean War, and the private life of Kim Jong-il. I’d refused to believe him. Ever since, I’d closed my mind to the reality of the regime in North Korea. Unless it directly affected my family, I had never wanted to know. I thought the reason people escaped was because of hunger, or, like me, out of an unexamined sense of curiosity. It had never occurred to me that people would escape for political reasons.
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Uncle Jung-gil Character Timeline in The Girl with Seven Names
The timeline below shows where the character Uncle Jung-gil appears in The Girl with Seven Names. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 20: Home Truths
Hyeonseo knocks on the door to the apartment, and Uncle Jung-gil and Aunt Sang-hee appear with huge smiles. Uncle Jung-gil is actually Father’s cousin who defected...
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Uncle Jung-gil informs Hyeonseo that South Korea didn’t really start the Korean War. It was actually North...
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Hyeonseo can hardly believe Uncle Jung-gil ’s claims, and she secretly wonders if he is crazy, but he seems nice enough....
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Chapter 21: The Suitor
...home to North Korea. Aunt Sang-hee happily agrees to allow Hyeonseo live with her and Uncle Jung-gil long-term, and Hyeonseo accepts; however, if Hyeonseo had realized how much she was going to...
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...grows more and more homesick and feels trapped in a foreign land without an identity. Uncle Jung-gil and Aunt Sang-hee are kind and accommodating, but China isn’t home, and Hyeonseo grows increasingly...
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Chapter 22: The Wedding Trap
By 2000, Uncle Jung-gil gives Hyeonseo a new cellphone just as the wedding plans really begin to pick up....
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Chapter 26: Interrogation
...her interrogator. He asks her about her parents, and she gives him Aunt Sang-hee and Uncle Jung-gil ’s information. The inspector hands her a copy of a Chinese newspaper and orders her...
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Chapter 29: The Comfort of Moonlight
...days of being held by the gang, Hyeonseo finally gets the courage up to call Uncle Jung-gil . He agrees to pay the gang’s fee immediately, but it still takes two days...
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Chapter 33: The Teddy-bear Conversations
...Korea because of hunger or curiosity, not for political reasons. She remembers all the things Uncle Jung-gil told her about North Korea and wonders if he was telling the truth. Then, Hyeonseo...
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Chapter 42: A Place of Ghosts and Wild Dogs
...feels her stomach flutter with nerves as she rings the bell to Aunt Sang-hee and Uncle Jung-gil ’s door. Aunt Sang-hee answers and is genuinely happy to see Hyeonseo. Hyeonseo repaid her...
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