Ravi’s mom had one eye. He hated her. She collected little weeds and such to sell... she was such an embarrassment for him. There was this one day during elementary school, and his mom came. He threw her a hateful look and ran out. The next day at school his friends teased "Your mom has only one eye?".
He wished that his mom would just disappear from this world so he said to my mom, "Mom, why don't you have the other eye?! You're only going to make me a laughing stock. Why don't you just die?" Mom did not respond.
That night...Ravi woke up, and went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. His mom was crying there, so quietly, as if she was afraid that she might wake him. He told himself that he would grow up and become successful, because he hated his one-eyed mom and their desperate poverty.
Then he left mom and studied really hard. He got accepted in the Seoul University, then got married, bought a house of his own and had kids, too. He was living happily as a successful man.
This happiness was getting bigger and bigger, when someone unexpected came to see him "What?! Who's this?!"... It was his mother...Still with her one eye. His little girl ran away, scared of the mom's eye.
And he asked her, "Who are you? I don't know you!!!" . He screamed at her "How dare you come to my house and scare my daughter! Get out here now!" And to this, his mother quietly answered, "oh, I'm so sorry. I may have gotten the wrong address," and she disappeared.
One day, a letter regarding a school reunion came to his house. He went down to the old shack, that he used to call a house...just out of curiosity there, he found his mother fallen on the cold ground. But he did not shed a single tear. She had a piece of paper in her hand.... it was a letter to him.
She wrote...My Son,
I think my life has been long enough now. Would it be too much to ask if I wanted you to come visit me once in a while? I miss you so much. And I was so glad when I heard you were coming for the reunion. But I decided not to go to the school.... For you... I'm sorry that I only have one eye.
You see, when you were very little, you got into an accident, and lost your eye. As a mother, I couldn't stand watching you having to grow up with only one eye... so I gave you mine... I was so proud that my son could see a whole new world for me, in my place, with that eye. I was never upset at you for anything you did. The times that you were angry with me. I thought to myself, 'it's because you love me.' I miss the times when you were still young around me.
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