In this summer vacation, I traveled to Europe for a month. Lots of famous heritages and architecture, which I saw only in books before, gave me great impressions, but most of all, the most impressive place was the East Side Gallery of Germany.
  The East Side Gallery consists of 105 paintings, all painted in 1990, by artists from all over the world. Also, it’s the largest and longest-lasting open-air gallery in the world. Above all, the gallery is meaningful because it was created on the east side of the Berlin Wall, which was separated from the west side of Germany. From a current view, it was only a thin wall, but the wall divided one country into two. In 1989, when the Berlin Wall collapsed, the boundary line of East and West Germany collapsed and it has now become a gallery that people can easily enjoy while walking through it.
  Korea is also a country separated into two, and it’s the only divided country in the world. After only 5 years of Korean independence from Japan in 1945, the Korean War began and the country eventually was divided. It’s been 65 years since the war began, but South and North Korea are still in a truce.
  Until now, there were times when South and North Korea had conflicts or lived in peace. However, these days, starting from the recent explosion in the demilitarized zone, South and North Korea have been in extreme tension. The South started broadcasting on loudspeakers toward the North, and the North bombarded the western front. Fortunately, after a conference, the South and North negotiated and the tension subsided, but nobody knows if a war might start again.
  Honestly, I haven’t been thinking about the reunification of Korea. However, after I watched the change of the Berlin Wall to a gallery where people can walk around easily, I felt envious of Germany and, at the same time, I felt sad about the Korean situation. Because of the current tension in Korea, the East Side Gallery that is filled with pictures that have messages of peace especially comes to my mind a lot. When will we easily cross the boundary between South and North Korea?