'Everything feels like a sin,' survivor wrote

The UNESCO Memory of the World Committee for Asia and the Pacific (MOWCAP) announced Thursday at its 11th general assembly in Jakarta, Indonesia, that it had inscribed South Korea's "Danwon High School 4.16 Archive" and "Suunjabbang and Eumsik dimibang" on the Asia-Pacific regional register. Pictured are personal life history records of the victims. [Cultural Heritage Administration]
The UNESCO Memory of the World Committee for Asia and the Pacific (MOWCAP) announced Thursday at its 11th general assembly in Jakarta, Indonesia, that it had inscribed South Korea's "Danwon High School 4.16 Archive" and "Suunjabbang and Eumsik dimibang" on the Asia-Pacific regional register. Pictured are personal life history records of the victims. [Cultural Heritage Administration]

"Every time I think of the friends I could not escape with, eating, sleeping, laughing and talking all feel like sins." — from the written record of a Sewol disaster survivor

Records documenting the Sewol ferry disaster have been inscribed on the UNESCO Memory of the World Asia-Pacific regional register, officials said Thursday.

The "Danwon High School 4.16 Archive," now part of the UNESCO Memory of the World, holds the memories of victims, survivors and their families who lived through that heartbreaking April.

The collection totals 235,220 items and includes calendars and planners capturing the everyday lives of Danwon High School students who perished in the disaster, as well as materials documenting efforts to preserve the school's classrooms.

The Cultural Heritage Administration said the archive contains "the facts witnessed firsthand and the emotions shared by bereaved families and the public, as well as the wounds suffered — and the efforts toward recovery — by individuals, families and local communities."

The archive carries particular significance because it reflects the perspectives not of the state or any specific institution, but of bereaved families, survivors and ordinary citizens who watched the accident unfold and its aftermath. On yellow sheets of paper bearing large ribbon drawings, messages read: "We are sorry we could not protect you, Danwon students" and "We will pray for the missing students to return safely."

A Cultural Heritage Administration official said the archive captures "the social reality wrought by the disaster — something that cannot be found in records written by those who faced the tragedy from other vantage points, such as government agencies or corporations."

The Korean Committee for the Memory of the World had earlier assessed that "the very process of documenting the reality of a social disaster — and forming an archive from it — is itself a process of healing and recovering from the pain and wounds of that disaster."

With this inscription, the story of the Sewol has become a heritage to be remembered not only in South Korea but around the world.

Kim Sun-gil, secretary general of the April 16 Sewol Disaster Families Association and mother of Jin Yun-hee, a second-year student in Class 9 at Danwon High School, said she hopes the inscription "will not end with simply being registered as a documentary heritage, but will become a force for educating and informing future generations about the pain and truth of the Sewol disaster."

Documentary heritage encompasses written materials, books, audiovisual records, maps, musical scores and more. The UNESCO Memory of the World is divided into an "international register" recognizing records of global significance and importance to humanity, and a "regional register" reflecting historical significance at the regional level.

South Korea has placed a total of 20 items on the international register, beginning with "Hunminjeongeum" and the "Annals of the Joseon Dynasty" in 1997. Including the Danwon High School 4.16 Archive, the country now holds eight entries on the Asia-Pacific regional register.

Countries may submit up to three nominations per cycle to the Asia-Pacific regional register, with applications accepted every two years.


hss@heraldcorp.com