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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Lucknow Sentinel, 2016-01-13, Page 44 Lucknow Sentinel • Wednesday, January 13, 2016 www.lucknowsentinel.com The Lucknow Sentinel PUBLISHED WEEKLY P.O. Box 400, 619 Campbell Street Lucknow Ontario NOG 2H0 phone: 519-528-2822 fax: 519-528-3529 www.lucknowsentinel.com E POSTMEDIA JOHN BAUMAN Group Manager, Media Sales john. bauman@sunmed ia.ca JOY JURJENS Office Administrator I ucknow.sentinel@sunmed ia. ca LINDSAY THEODULE Media Sales Consultant li ndsay.theodule@sun media.ca MARIE DAVID Group Advertising Director 519 376-2250 ext. 514301 or 510 364-2001 ext. 531024 Publications Mail Agreement No. 40064683 RETURN UNDELIVERABLE CANADIAN ADDRESSES TO SENTINEL CIRCULATION DEPARTMENT P.O. Box 400 Lucknow ON NOG 2H0 For any non -deliveries or delivery concerns: 519-528-2822 • lucknow.sentinel@sunmedia.ca SUBSCRIPTIONS Regular one year $40.00 + $2.00 =$42.00 Senior one year $35.00 41.75 = $36.75 Two year regular $70.00 + 3.50 = $73.50 Senior two year $60.00 + $3.00 = $63.00 Office Hours: Monday, Wednesday to Friday, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. All advertising and editorial deadlines: Friday 2 p.m. Changes of address, orders for subscriptions, and undeliverable copies (return postage guaranteed) are to be sent to The Lucknow Sentinel at the address indicated here. Advertising is accepted on the condition that in the event of a typographical error, the portion of the advertising space occupied by the erroneous item together with a reasonable allowance for signature, wit not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisement will be paid at the applicable rates. The Sentinel is available on microfilm at: GODERICH LIBRARY, (from 1875) 52 Montreal Street Goderich ON N7A 1 M3 Goderichlibrary@huroncounty.ca KINCARDINE LIBRARY, (from 1875 to 1900 & 1935 to 1959) 727 Queen Street Kincardine ON N2Z 1Z9 The Lucknow Sentinel is a member of the National Newsmedia Council, which is an independent ethical organization established to deal with editorial concerns. For more information or to file a complaint go to www.mediacouncil.ca or call tot free 1-844-877-1163. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canadian Periodical Fund (CPF) for our publishing activities. Canada /4oc a Member of the Canadian Community Newspaper Association and the Ontario Community Newspapers Association Successful levee held at Lucknow Legion Ruth Dobrensky Lucknow News Ihope everyone had a happy new year and didn't over -celebrate. It was nice to see that a rel- atively local woman, Wanda Snobelen, is getting her pic- ture and story in the Faces of Farming calendar for 2016. It's always good to see when the hard work of our local farmers is acknowledged in such a way. Many of us are slowing down after the busy season of Christmas and New Year, but many are gearing up for the 2016 year and our calendars are already filling up with events and plans. For exam- ple, last Wednesday, Jan. 6, was not only Epiphany, but Ukrainian Christmas Eve for me. In fact it was Christmas Eve for everyone in the world who follows the Julian calen- dar, all orthodox churches in eastern Europe, the near east and Africa, celebrated Christ- mas last Wednesday. Lucknow Legion, Branch 309, held a lovely Levee on New Year's day with many from the community attend- ing. They then started the year off with the first of their Saturday night wing nights for the year. Don't forget that winter is finally here and to drive care- fully and watch out for that dangerous black ice. Sympathy of the commu- nity to the families of: Isabel Schultz, 96, Clinton; Jean MacDonald, 81, Wingham (Teeswater); Terry Nethery, 81, Wingham; Thomas Estrick, 74, Lucknow (for- merly Kincardine); Gerald Whynotte, 83, Lucknow (for- merly Kincardine); Joseph Kieffer, 94, Teeswater; Grace Hoph, 75, Lucknow; Kim Johnston, 55, Kincardine; Hoping citizens of North Korea can one day experience the peace Kincardine enjoys Darryl Coote Reporter At around midnight Wednes- day, Jan. 5, 2016, I read a tweet stat- ing China had detected seismic activity in North Korea. My first thought on reading this was a four-letter expletive. The tweet told me the petulant prison state had conducted an underground nuclear test, its fourth ever, and had taken another bold, defiant step towards becom- ing an atomic power. I knew this because I had seen it before. For the past six years before moving to Kincardine, South Korea was my home, and in 2013 I worked in the country's capital of Seoul, copy editing for the nation's largest news agency. I had the job for little over a month when on a Saturday night in January my phone rang. It was the office. North Korea was about to conduct a nuclear test, I was told. From the large window of my 12th -floor loft in one of the world's most populated cities, I could see thousands of people below out bar hopping or whatnot, enjoying themselves on a weekend night. And it was snowing. I made a joke about nuclear winter to the reporter on the line. He laughed. All night we filed stories, and as 4 a.m. rolled by I looked out the window again, at the snow, at the then mostly vacant street below, and like a mass exodus of my guts I felt hollowed out by the cold elec- tric shiver that ran through me. Seoul is less than 100 km from the border with North Korea. If war broke out, I've read estimates that at least 25 per cent of the South Korean capital would be razed. I remember the snowflakes that night were gigantic, articulated and fell slow. And I remember thinking, what if the unpredictable North decided instead of conduct- ing an underground nuclear test to drop one on its southern neighbour? The feeling of impotence was instant, frightening and incompasating. I remember sitting there, staring out the window, envisioning Old Testament wrath and destruction outside. Of the cloud mushroom- ing behind the modem labyrinth of concrete buildings as the shock- wave lay dead all as it moved towards my apartment However unlikely this was, knowing the deranged North could have that capability without any of us being able to do a damn thing about it was the fuel of nightmares. All through the night the reporter and I wrote copy on updates coming from the South Korean president and musings from experts on the activity seen with satellites in the North as we waited for nothing to happen. The North would conduct its nuclear test Feb. 12 while the copy editing desk was surprisingly all out to lunch together. And when we got back to the office, I learned covering the nuclear militarization of a Valerlie Dickey, 82, Southgate Twp.; Dorthy Hallam, 82, Lucknow (formerly R4, Kin- cardine); Fern MacDonald, 96, Ripley (formerly Luc - know); James Gillies, 91, Toronto (formerly Teeswa- ter); Donalda Pollard, 98, Rip- ley; Noel Murray, 70, Luc - know; S. Brian Snobelen, 64, Vancouver, B.C.; Ian McPher- son, WW II Veteran, 95, Tiver- ton (formerly Culross Twp.); Margaret Robinson, 103, Wingham; Bill Johnston, 84, Wingham; Nancy Watson, 66, Auburn; and Francis Lumley, 57, St. Albert, AB (son of the late Harry Lumley). Darryl Coote/Kincardine News The view from the roof of author's former residence in Seoul, South Korea. belligerent nation is as prosaic as covering any other announcement It's countless press conferences where talking heads talk with the addition of sabres rattling. However, on that January night, weeks before the test would be con- ducted while I talked to the reporter on the other end of the line, the paralysis I felt fast passed, but the moment of dreadful realization and the empty feeling it gave me in my chest cavity is something I will now forever be able to recall. And the spectre of that moment came back to me when I read the tweet last Wednesday night, and I wondered, when will this end? Howwill this end? And I wondered this then as I do now, not for me or even for my friends that still live south of the 38th parallel, but from worry for my North Korean brothers and sis- ters who have been living 70 years a life worse than living through the holocaust. As I write this Sunday morning, it is snowing, and I realize North Korea is as close to me now in my Princess Street apartment as it was when I was a bus ride away from the totalitarian country. Those two countries have been written into my DNA, just as Kin- cardine is now being etched in there, too. Call me hyperbolic, dramatic. I might be, though I doubt it However, on this cold Sunday morning, as the snowblows steady outside, my mind is with those citi- zens of North Korea held hostage by their oafish ruler. One can only hope that they, too, could experience the peace we enjoy here daily.