The tension between youthful idealism and mature practicality would work itself out in thousands of ways for this generation of Korea’s best and brightest. Whatever choice each made, they all experienced the culture shock common with students moving back from the developed economy of the metropolitan power ti their poorer, subjugated homelands. Students returning on the Shimonoseki ferry from long sojourns in Japan were greeted by the dismal sight of bare hills along the Korean coast, a stark contrast to the verdant Japanese mountains. Disembarking amidst the coolies and porters swarming over the quay to offload cargo, they must have also thought of the contrast provided by the more mechanized ports of Japan. They returned to a Korea in the throes of change. And they added their youthful enthusiasm to what was to become an intellectual renaissance under the Cultural Policy in 1920s Korea.
Korea’s Twentieth-century Odyssey, chapter 2 - Michael Edson Robinson.
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