By Helan B. Park

Recently, I had an opportunity to re-evaluate my focus in life. Sometimes we all have those times when we feel overworked, tired and frustrated with our jobs and lives. Like a soldier we wake before the sun rises, mechanically dressing, eating and driving to work. Punching in and punching out at the end of the day and going home in the dark to put your aching body to bed long after the kids are asleep. Days go by like this before we realize that we have lost the luster and passion for our lives. Our hearts grow stone cold. Sure, there are short-term goals, like money and what it can buy. After purchasing that expensive German car and dressing in clothes that make even your close friends envious of your possessions, even that thrill quickly dissipates. We grow old. We know we will die someday and we are left sometimes wondering if we work hard all our lives just to be very tired and die in the end. It’s a dismal feeling and it gets to everyone sooner or later.

I was feeling hardened about life until this weekend. I volunteered to go down with my church to Mexico on a one-day mission to help the under-privileged Mexican neighbors. Tijuana, Mexico just thirty minutes across the border. Young Nak Church regularly goes down to Mexico at least once a month with food, toys, and clothing. In addition there are a dedicated number of dentists, doctors, pharmacists, barbers all who without compensation take the entire day to devote to people they don’t know. Its young and old, both first and second generation Korean-Americans who band together to help the needy. I don’t know what I was searching for. I have no skill that can obviously help and I was not prepared to expect anything. I had never been to Tijuana.

We met early Saturday morning. Bleary-eyed, we all piled into three vans. I slept most of the way there. But once across the border, I knew I was in for a surprise. I grew up comfortably in the Valley. My father occasionally drove us through skid row to show how the other side lived to help us understand how fortunate our family was. But I was stunned to see row after row of shacks, cinder block houses and dirt roads. Not even asphalt! I was nervous the van’s shocks were going to give out as we bounced over the dirt road with dust clouds kicked up by the tires. There were sickly stray dogs everywhere, just adding to the third-world type of feeling. It was a depressing sight as we pulled up the little chapel where people have already lined up with the children, probably all morning, for the curious Korean folks who come to that church from time to time. I was deeply humbled as I sat in their chapel, broken windows and spare interior. There were still out-houses and no plumbing. I silently bowed my head in prayer and thanked God for giving me the opportunity to be there and assist in the mission. No suits, no gavel and no Judge. I was in an unfamiliar arena.

It was an interesting sight to behold from my viewpoint. I can speak broken Korean, the older elders and deacons speak broken English and we all spoke broken Spanish. It was more like Kor-Span-glish. Despite the language differences as well as all the cultural differences, we were all able to speak one language...one of love and compassion. There is no need to explain why we were there as it is evident by our presence. I spent time next to an older Korean grandmother who was gleefully shouting out orders to the younger volunteers as she rushed this way and that way wrapping the hamburgers and quite speedily and dexterously for her age I might add. It was hot and sweaty work. We must have grilled over three hundred hamburgers and dispensed hundreds of pills, ointments, and other medications. The doctors set up a makeshift exam room and started filling cavities and pulling rotten teeth. We had one Caucasian woman there who spoke English, Spanish and Korean who translated medical ailments to the medical doctor. It was like a war time triage, MASH unit without the combat uniforms.

After the last patient was seen and all the equipment loaded into the van, a different person was returning to the United States. I came home sweaty, dirty and extremely tired. But ironically, I was the happiest I had been in a long time. This story is not to get recognition, and I doubt that the volunteers at Love Tijuana would want it at all. I think the volunteers have already discovered the true rewards of helping those in need. At some point in life we must realize that life is not all about making money. Rather, at some point we must undertake tasks and issues that are beyond our inner circle. Our radius of thinking must be widened to encompass compassion for our fellow brothers and sisters here and abroad. Instead of glumly confined to our life and our problems, open your eyes! See the world and how much love and ourselves are needed by people we haven’t even met. I’m not advocating that you sign up with a mission group. Rather, I am directly challenging you to envision life with passion and love for those who need it right here! Neighbors, schools, church and even your own family members! Push yourself out of the comfort zone and realize your potential for compassion and love.

Helan Park has been a Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney since 1996. Mrs. Park was born in Los Angeles to immigrant parents and grew up in the sleepy suburbs of Simi Valley. She graduated from U.C. Berkeley with a degree in Political Science-Economy. In 1995 Mrs. Park graduated from Lewis and Clark Law School in Portland, Oregon. As a law student, she clerked for the United States Attorney’s Office and worked in a legal clinic for lower income families. Upon graduation from law school, Mrs. Park moved back to her native Los Angeles and began her career as a prosecutor for Ventura County District Attorney’s Office. On her free time, she swims competitively and coaches swimming to children. Mrs. Park is also involved with her church at Young Nak English Ministry.