Paper

 

This work derives from my experience about my nationality. I recently changed my nationality from North to South Korean and received a new passport. Although this didn’t change my personal identity, I noticed a big change in how I was perceived by others. Also, just by having different words written on my travel documents, I am now able to travel much more freely and do simple things easily like open a bank account. It made me feel so strange because they are just ‘paper’ to me same as ‘paper’ using in toilet. And I reminded a Japanese song called ‘Goat Mail’ which I used to learn and most of Japanese people also do when they were little. The song is shown below.

 

1 The White goat sent a letter to the Black Goat.

The Black Goat ate it up before he'd read it.

Then, "Hmmm," he thought, "Better write a letter"-----

Dear White goat,

What was in that letter you wrote?

 

2 The Black Goat sent a letter to the White Goat.

The White Goat ate it up before he'd read it.

Then, "Hmmm," he thought, "Better write a letter"-----

Dear Black Goat,

What was in that letter you wrote?

 

Verses 1&2 are repeated again and again, and goats never read their letters. I found myself familiar with these goats, because they seem to know generally the letter is a written message and could be something important however the goats eat them up, that is to say eventually the letter have no more meaning to them than just ‘paper’ (food).