Kim Yang-Sun
Posted on 04/20/2007 4:29:22 AM PDT by COUNTrecount
THE grandfather of Cho Seung-Hui said yesterday: "Son of a bitch. It serves him right he died with his victims."
Kim Hyang-Sik, 82, said he had a doom-laden dream of Cho's parents the night of his murderous rampage - and woke to hear the news of the massacre and his grandson's death.
He watched Cho's sick video of himself holding a gun to his head.
His sister Kim Yang-Sun, 85, who also saw it, told the Mirror that afterwards her brother was so distraught he had "gone away for a few days to calm himself down and avoid more questions".
She too repeatedly referred to the killer as "son of a bitch" or "a***hole" and said his mother Kim Hyang-Yim had problems with him from infancy.
Yang-Sun revealed the eight-year-old was diagnosed as autistic soon after his family emigrated to the US.
She said: "He was very quiet and only followed his mother and father around and when others called his name he just answered yes or no but never showed any feelings or motions.
"We started to worry that he was autistic - that was the big concern of his mother. He was even a loner as a child.
"Soon after they got to America his mother was so worried about his inability to talk she took him to hospital and he was diagnosed as autistic."
Yang-Sun spoke at her tiny one roomed shack inside a vinyl farm shelter in the Gohyang area of South Korea's capital Seoul.
The family had stayed there the night before they emigrated in 1992. Yang-Sun said Cho's mother had been reluctant to marry her older husband.
She said: "She had five brothers and sisters and she was the second eldest child. She took care of them after she graduated from high school, which meant a lot of self-sacrifice.
"Hyang-Yim was a full-time house person on one of her parents' small farms outside Seoul. She stayed at home like that for years and was still single at home when she was 29.
"We became worried that she was spending too much time at home with her brothers and sisters and family and getting to old for a husband.
"So the family decided to force her into a blind date to find a husband. She met Cho Sung-Tae on that date. He was 10 years older at 39 and still single too. They decided to get married soon after that.
"She didn't want to but her family insisted because we thought she was getting past the right age and it would be good for her.
"Her husband was very serious and quiet and careful with money. He was not very sociable and not very friendly to his mother-in-law and father-in-law.
"After they were married he went away twice to Saudi Arabia in the 80s to try to make some money in the construction boom. He came back with about £2,000, which was enough to buy a small house in Seoul. He also ran a second-hand bookstore. His mother was living in the States on a long term visit to stay with his sister. She asked him to bring his family to live there.
"His sold the house to pay for the emigration costs and rented instead but there were lots of delays and eventually the whole process to get the permissions and organise things took eight years.
"By that time the money from the house was nearly gone. They were barely making ends meet so they had nothing to lose and had this idea of the American dream where there was a lot of money to be made."
She went on: "The reaction of my brother was that Seung-Hui was a troublemaker and it served him right that he died because he caused his mother a lot of problems. He was more worried about his daughter.
"He spoke to a few reporters to express sympathy to victims' families on behalf of our family but now he has gone away. He is 82 and lives quietly on a small farm and all this is too much for him."
Other relatives admitted Cho's parents had always been aware of his problems but had neither the time nor money for specialist help.
His uncle Chan Kim, 56, said: "He wasn't like a normal kid. We were worried about him not talking.
"Both his parents knew he had mental problems but they were poor and they couldn't send him to a special hospital in the United States.
"His mother and sister were asking his friends to help instead.
"His parents worked and did not have time to look after his condition and didn't give him special treatment.
"They had no time or money to look after his special problem even though they knew he was autistic."
Kim Yang-Sun
Whoever went all the way to Korea to drag old grandparents into the sensational, is sick themselves.
If he grew up in such poverty, and could not have special attention, how could he afford college. If he was provided with a grant or some other scholarship, you mean that he was never tested or otherwise assessed? I don’t get it!!
Also, their sincerity aside, could this be because South Koreans are somewhat expecting or anticipating a backlash against Koreans similar to the spate of anti-Americanism which cropped up in South Korea after two children were accidentally run over by American soldiers?
It's the Federal government's fault. Also known as B.F. (Bush's Fault) If we only had federal healthcare for all then this poor boy could have been taken care of and 32 other lives would have been saved. But this is what we got when we rejected Hillary's healthcare plan... < /sarcasm >
I wondered about autism when it was revealed that the kid had never really "talked" to anyone at anytime in his life.
I was thinking he had some public assistance to get into college and if that’s the case there ought to be some qualifiers attached to that... like a basic background check... right??? Or does just any Joe Shmoe come up an ask for money and get it handed to him gratis, no matter what???
Yes, and was his High School honest in the reports it must have provided to VT? And what H.S. teachers wrote letters of recommendation? Did they lie?
How does having a sister who went to Princeton fit into this story/description?
I am beginning to suspect that there were quite a few “breakdowns” in the system. This kid was shuffled right on through because nobody wanted to deal with him. That also might explain why his “plays” looked like the work of a deranged 12-year old.
Now there’s some cultural diversity for ya!
Interesting. Never thought of it that way. The South Korean Left exploited the bodies of those children, and now Koreans are wondering if anyone will do the same here. It’s plausible.
Somebody on another thread brought up Asperger’s Syndrome. I wonder.
}:-)4
The interesting thing was that he was (according to at least one report I saw) carrying a 4.0 GPA, and on track to graduate in a month, which amazes me given the lack of quality of the plays he wrote.
}:-)4
Check this article out:
About halfway down the article it says that some teachers gave him A’s because they were afraid of him.
I think you’re looking too deep. Asians are very family oriented. If you do something to disgrace your family, the family disowns you, very unlike Johnny Talibans parents.
“If he grew up in such poverty, and could not have special attention, how could he afford college. If he was provided with a grant or some other scholarship, you mean that he was never tested or otherwise assessed? I don’t get it!!”
the public school system is full of special needs services.
Testing - individual educational plans (IEPs) - specialized classes.
If the parents couldn’t help, certainly Cho must have raised red flags at school with his teachers.
There’s something very fishy about this story.
Huh? You think this papa-san is spinning a story here? Get a grip.
Great....now those with autism will be fearing a “backlash”. /sarc
I agree. How was this kid able to get through high school, let alone college? Didn't ANY of his high school teachers ever contact the parents or higher ups?
The idea that this could be an attempt to avert a backlash against Koreans is based, at least in part, by this BBC article: here. At least some Koreans are expecting Americans to be as harsh to Koreans as Koreans were to Americans after those two children were run over.
“Somebody on another thread brought up Asperger’s Syndrome. I wonder.”
Asperger’s kids are usually verbal...sometimes extremely so.
They focus on a subject (numbers, historical event, dinasaurs...etc) and can go on and on about, compiling large amounts of info on their pet subject.
My son’s speech therapist also had an Asperger’s girl as a client - 5 yrs. old.
Her thing was birthdays.
You tell her the day and year you were born...she can instantly and accurately tell you what day of the week it was.
She cannot tell you how old you are - but her brain can somehow figure out what day of the week it was, no matter what year it was.
"They had no time or money to look after his special problem even though they knew he was autistic."
This may be the socialist British press irresponsibly putting words in her mouth (and a "poor immigrant" line that our MSM may eagerly follow) but consider the following:
The parents owned a house in a decent neighborhood.
By media accounts, they own a dry-cleaning business.
Cho's sister attended Princeton. Even if she did so on a scholarship, there had to be costs picked up by the parents. She also interned with the DOS in Bangkok -- was every single expense paid by the government?
Cho attended, and boarded at, a state university. There's been no mention of a scholarship. Who paid the tuition, the dorm fees, the book fees and the living expenses?
Cho had a decent computer, printer (as evidenced by the "manifesto" exploited by NBC), and digital camera. Who paid for those?
Between the guns, ammo, rented car, target range practice, etc., Cho spent upwards of at least $2,000 in planning his rampage. Where did he get the money?
Finally, if Cho's mother was so concerned about his "autism" (it's obvious his problems were far worse than that, but defining psychosis as autism is a far more sympathetic hook, as in "we are all victims," even when we become mass-murderers), why send him away -- it was upwards of a 4-hour drive, and the kid didn't have a car -- to live and study at a public university? I'm sure there were schools closer to home.
It wouldn't surprise me to learn that the parents wanted the kid out of the house (out of sight, out of mind), and in so doing foisted a killer on society.
Keep in mind that the general myth in Europe is that, since we don't have (outrageously inefficient) government health care, everyone except the rich in this country goes without it, because no one, particularly the poor, oppressed minorities that Americans inhumanely expect to fend for themselves (sarc) can afford it.
I think he probably tested well and since he didn’t really speak to anyone, he wasn’t disruptive in class. The teachers probably just gave him a free pass thinking that he was a Korean national who just didn’t speak good English. His parents probably didn’t do anything as long as he was staying out of trouble and earning good grades. I think the whole thing is very sad.
However, I don’t think that much will change because the PC proponents in the U.S. have a excessive, by now- institutionalized and shamefully favored status in the courts and in ‘public opinion’.
....And the whole point of putting in “their sincerity aside” was to allow for them to also be sincere.
That's unfortunate, but there will be an interesting lesson for our Korean friends here -- Americans will not react like that.
Agreed that the vast majority of Americans won’t—and that this could actual be good for Korean-American relations when the Koreans see that Americans are not so vindictive, and that their anger is directed at a murdering psychopath, not a South Korean.
The absurd thing is, Americans are least likely of all to blame ethnicity in a situation like this, but we are most likely to be called racist.
We know exactly who is responsible for this abominable event...
...the NRA and the gun manufacturers.
</sarcasm>
Maybe all the teachers were afraid to give him anything less.
That was not an insult. Simply a reaction to a tiresome knee jerk reaction.
comment 30 (on this thread).
You said — “I wondered about autism when it was revealed that the kid had never really “talked” to anyone at anytime in his life.”
He had no problem “talking” — when he wanted to. It was simply that he *refused* to do so. His dorm-mates said he could talk when he wanted, but pretty much all the time he never wanted to.
And if you think he was somehow incapable or had some impediment that prevented him from speaking very well — just listen to his video “manifesto”. You can see *immediately* that he has absolutely no problem talking.
Regards,
Star Traveler
P.S. — That doesn’t mean that he did not have a problem talking when he first came to this country. Apparently he did. But, he has gotten past that a long time ago (as far as his “capability” is concerned). However, he may have retained the emotional baggage from that time...
Here's some info from the Autism Society:
Some individuals mildly affected may exhibit only slight delays in language and greater challenges with social interactions. They may have difficulty initiating and/or maintaining a conversation. Their communication is often described as talking at others instead of to them. (For example, monologue on a favorite subject that continues despite attempts by others to interject comments).
http://www.autism-society.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_whatis_characteristics
Everything they make they spend on their kids- they live frugal ascetic lives. IN Fairfax look for the first dry cleaner shops open and the last to close. In Baltimore look forr the first liquor stores open and the last to close. They give EVERYTHING they make to their kids to help them succeed thru education. How does the owner of a dry cleaner shop send his daughter to Princeton? Back-breaking work and saving everything he can scrape up from her birth for the goal. And son to VT? VT like other Virginia state schools are actually bargain tuition for Virginia residents.
I do pity these people because they had a troubled kid who was never diagnosed. It can be emotionally paralyzing to raise a child like this and never have answers and just get up and work every day and go to bed and do it again.
If you have walked this walk with a troubled kid no one could give you answers about, you know what I mean and if you haven’t, you never will. I would not expect this mother and father to have a very long life span after all this.
No reasonable person has any business critiquing how they “paid” for their daughter to go to Princeton or what the daughter does with her life, which in an Asian cultural sense is also ruined now because no one from a “good family” will ever choose to marry her
If you knew the number of totally whacked out kids who are sent away to college you would be shocked.
Parents of really crazy kids get very tired of caring for them. Sending them away allows the parents to pretend to themselves that their kids are better and it's usually cheaper than putting them into an institution. Of course once the kid gets to college he gets into alcohol and other drugs that do not mix well with the prescription meds he is on and he's back in the mental hospital again. Sometimes the parents don't even come to the hospital, they want to distance themselves so much.
He didn’t have any problem talking on his self-produced “Triumph of the Will” movies.
“or what the daughter does with her life, which in an Asian cultural sense is also ruined now because no one from a “good family” will ever choose to marry her”
If she’s smart she’ll marry a non-Korean, or a very assimilated Korean.
V.P.I - Virginia Polytechnic INSTITUTION
See post 36, I tried to explain what I meant.
-the story reminds me of Rainman....only he was described as a savant.
I think your right ,”everyone gets the money”, Uh, Except Americans.
The guy never should have been let in this country, during the immigration period when Ellis Island was operating , people with sickness or defects were sent back to their country of Origin.
As a non Citizen , How was he able to buy a gun??
Took me about 6 months or so to get a Concealed Carry Permit.
In Virginia, it’s legal for a resident alien with a valid green card and secondary proof of in-state residence (like a utility bill or a check with a matching address on it) to buy a handgun. They’re considered Virginia residents, just like US citizens. (Virginia does have a one-handgun-per-month restriction, which is probably why he bought the .22 Walther on 9 February, and the 9mm Glock on 9 March.)
}:-)4
How is the fam? I'll bet they are all ready for summer vacation already.
After this last vacation filled with rain/snow/and stomach bug, it’s going to be a long time before I want to hear the word “vacation.” :)
We’re all glad to be back to the school routine.
Just waiting for the ground to dry out for baseball.
And you?
How’s hubby and family doing?
Just had to link my thread here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1820721/posts
(My reaction to a blog that in part insuates that mass reprisals will ensue)
Spare me the ethnic victimology. I've never thought of Asians as anything but hard-working, but hard work is not confined to one culture. We owned our own family business for years, and I'm no stranger to 12-hour days, manual labor, raising kids and making ends meet. My parents were poor hard-working immigrants with a child, my brother, who had severe learning difficulties and emotional/behaviorial problems, and they begged -- no crawled -- to get him help, and they did. He never went to college, but he's now a self-sufficient, financially comfortable adult. It took a long time, and a lot of sacrifice on my parents' part.
I made no mention of ethnicity, nor did I imply it, in my original comments -- those assumed insults are solely your projections.
My comments were made in response to the quotes from the grandparents that Cho's parents "could not afford" to get him help, and the contrast between that and what we know of their lifestyle. I would certainly consider it far more important, and responsible, to get a disturbed youngster professional help than to send him to college, and if the grandparents' comments are true, he did not get that help.
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