On the roof
201202631 Lee, Eun Young
I was raised by my grandma until I became eight years old for my parents were busy for the living. I spend most of my time with my grandparents. My grandparents lived in Yongho Dong in Busan. It was an old house. All the stickers from the gums and lots of scribble were on the faded and worn wall. The steps were gray colored and it was quite steep. The door was made of iron and glass. Every time I opened that door, the door scratches cement floor and made awkward screeching sounds. I didn't like the sound of that door. The house was so old that even restroom was outside of the house. Whenever I had to go to the restroom, I called my grandma to company me. Although it was physically uncomfortable and old house, it was the most calm and comfortable place to me.
What I liked most was the roof of the house. Because we lived in the second floor of the building we could use the roof freely. It was somehow special but unusual roof. About half of the roof were flat and covered by gray cement. My grandma used to put lots of croaks of all kinds of sauces on that gray part. Whenever I go up to the roof, I could smell little all the odd smells. Another half of the roof was covered by red roof tiles and it was a slope that looked like the half of triangles.
I liked to lie on the red roof with my grandma, especially during the summer night. In the day time the roof was heated because of strong sun shine. So, in the evening when I lie on the roof with my grandma, the back of my body was warm and the breeze on my face was cool. Even though we had dinner, when we were lying on the roof we loved to eat something. We ate corn, potatoes and watermelon. The potatoes little bit over baked with yellow sugar were my favorite. While lying on the roof, we could see lots of lots of stars. The stars were so twinkling and sparkling that I often felt that I was lying in the space full of stars. Sometimes, she told me how the Big Dipper looks like. She also told me lots of fairy tales on the roof. While listening to her stories, I fell into a sleep and leaved to adventures in dream.
When we were lying on the roof, my grandma always burned green spiral mosquito repellent incense so that mosquito can't bite me. I didn't like that smell too. It smelled like burning trashes. However, ironically, that smell always made me comfortable because it gave me a feeling of being protected by my grandma. I knew that she used mosquito incense only when I was with her. When she was working alone on the roof, she never burned mosquito incense. That horrible smell was also the scent of grandma's love.
It was the warmest moments in my life. I loved my grandma, I loved potatoes and I love the heated red roof. I just loved that atmosphere. However, when I became 8 years old, I started to live my parents, and when I became 13, my grandparents moved to another place. So after that I had no chances to go to the roof and lying there with my grandma. So, that memory is very precious to me. When life gets harder and harder, and when I start to feel that this world is getting colder and colder, I think of the warmness that I felt on the roof. The roof where warmest food, warmest smell and warmest love had exist……
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