Park Hye Jung and her daughter Ah Hyun at Managaha.
Park Hye Jung hopes that CNMI tourists sites will also have facilities for people with disabilities.
PARK Hye Jung, a South Korean writer and women empowerment advocate, is enjoying her visit to Saipan.
A person with disability for 29 years now, she likes to travel and among the other destinations she has already visited are Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, the U.S., Canada, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece and Italy.
On Saipan, she said she had been to Sugar Dock Beach and Managaha with her children, Ah Hyun and Ah Hye.
“The wonderful scenery created by the sea, sky and sun in Saipan left me speechless,” she said. “I don’t think I can forget the sunset of Saipan. And Managaha, where nature is preserved, is also a very memorable travel destination,” she said.
She noted, however, that many of the island’s tourist sites have no facilities for people with disabilities.
“A month before I came to Saipan, I booked a handicapped hand-control car through a rent-a-car website,” she said. “However, when I came here, there was no hand-control vehicle. I was so frustrated. As you know, without a car in Saipan, I literally can’t go anywhere.”
But she said she believes in the saying that “where there is a will, there is a way!”
“I tried to find a way somehow, and good people appeared and helped me,” she added, referring to former Rep. Marco Peter.
At the time, Park said she was dining at the Island Café & Restaurant where Peter was also a customer.
“The restaurant owner talked to him about me, and he made a call to Jesse Sablan, a friend of a rent-a-car company owner,” Park said.
She is grateful to Peter, Sablan and Island Café & Restaurant for their assistance.
She said because of them she received the hand-control parts for her wheelchair that were sent from Guam.
“They are among the noble people I’ve met in Saipan. In the end, it is people who save people, and only people are the answer! I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Island Café & Restaurant for taking care of me,” Park said.
She is also grateful to the island community for the kindness she has received from everyone she met.
“It was wonderful to see people living their lives passionately,” she said. “When I go back to Korea I will live ardently through the people of Saipan.”
Life as a gift
Park believes that her life is a gift and is also a story worth sharing.
“I am able to live more fully today than when I was a non-disabled person for 15 years. Indeed, the ordeal of my life has been a blessing. I wrote a book hoping that the ordeal could be a blessing, too, to the reader,” she said.
Her book’s title is “The Ordeal was a Blessing.”
“If a woman in a wheelchair like me can travel all over the world, advocate for women and write a book, then anyone can do it, too,” Park said.
She believes that many people can find happiness through travel.
“I have enjoyed unfamiliar travel destinations by myself in a wheelchair without spending a lot of money,” she said.
“Through travel, I’ve learned and have grown as a person. I want to be a person whose disability is not a problem,” Park said.
Spinal injury
Park was not born with a disability.
“When I was in high school, I had a spinal cord injury in an accident in which a huge sign fell on me. My injury caused paralysis. Since then, I can’t run, walk or stand at all.”
She said she blamed the world for her misfortune. “I asked myself, Why did this happen to me? But as time went by, I realized that I should be grateful for just being alive. I could have died in that accident.”
She said she eventually learned how to perform normal activities even when she is in a wheelchair. She even got employed despite her physical challenges.
“Whether it was a part-time or a full-time job, I applied for it. With the money I’ve saved, I traveled. And while traveling, I recovered my confidence by being alone in a completely unfamiliar place, and my life became happy,” Park said.
Author
Park, whose nickname is Hyunhye, said it took her a year and four months to write her book, “The Ordeal was a Blessing.”
“I wrote it hoping that my honest story could help someone,” she added.
“The book starts with the story of my becoming disabled in an accident in high school. However, it is not like a ‘manual’ for overcoming obstacles,” Park said.
In her book, she shares the lessons she learned while overcoming challenges. She also recounts her travels as a person in a wheelchair, and why she believes that her ordeal has been a blessing to her.
“I want to give courage and hope like a ray of light that leaks through the crack of the door to those who are so tired that they can’t even see hope,” she said.
“Think positively to see only the good side, and if there’s anything you want to do — do it no matter what! There should be nothing in life but being happy!”
