Bond Of Friendship Extends To Korea
By Jeff Gulley
When Osawatomie resident Will Cutburth was sent to Camp Carroll in South Korea, he had no idea that a decade-long friendship would form and that friends would bring a Korean visitor to Osawatomie.
Joo-Young Oh arrived in Osawatomie last week, his first time visiting the United States to stay with his friend Will and family for a few weeks. He looked right at home sitting among the patrons at the Whistle Stop on Thursday with Cutburth sharing the story of their friendship and why he came to Osawatomie.
“I decided to take some vacation for me,” Oh said. “I have been working as a journalist for five years and just decided to take a little break. So I just called him (Will).”
“And I said come here man,” Cutburth said.
He arrived in Kansas City Wednesday and had a very busy first day.
“He went to class with me in Ottawa,” Cutburth said. “Then we went to Central Heights and met with the fourth-grade class. He had a blast and they had a blast. Then we went to a Royals game.”
Oh said walking into Kaufman Stadium for the first time was an amazing experience.
“I had never seen a baseball stadium like that before,” he said. “We have baseball leagues and many stadiums all around the country. Baseball is very popular in Korea but Kaufman stadium is so great. It’s a special face of the American culture. Its such a family place. Not just a baseball park.”
On Thursday, he took some time to walk around downtown and go into some shops.
Oh said Osawatomie feels very comfortable to him, much like the small town outside of Seoul that he grew up in.
“Seoul is a huge city but I feel like I am in my hometown,” Oh said. “It like a Kansas City size.”
A Military Friendship
Cutburth and Oh met when they were partnered together as military policemen at Camp Carroll.
Military service of 26 months is mandatory for all Korean men and Oh entered the Korean military at 21-years of age.
“After high school, I went to the University and then I joined the army,” he said. “Because I had to.”
Just out of basic training, he was stationed at Camp Carroll during the 9/11 attacks and the camp was put on lock down.
Oh was on the base after being selected to be a part of the Korean Augmentation To the United States Army program (KATUSA). It’s a program that only exists in Korea.
To be selected, a soldier must test in the top one percent of all Korean Army soldiers which makes it a very sought after position. Oh said 60 percent of the KATUSA soldiers would be from the Korean Ivy League.
They are the educational elite of the Korean Army,” Cutburth said. “And they are essential for us to do our job.”
Cutburth arrived at the base in 2002 and Oh was there as a KATUSA soldier. They were partnered for two years.
“Its normally a one year tour but you can voluntarily extend,” Cutburth said. “The people that I worked with, I have never found that anywhere else. The amount of camaraderie and knowing that if I would stumble and fall, there was someone there to pick me up. I still view everyone of those guys as my family and I was in the war in Iraq but I never found anything like that.”
When Cutburth left Korea, he and Oh fell out of touch. We tried to email and it was hard. During that time, Cutburth was sent to Iraq and was injured in 2005.
“I was a gunner in a humvee and took shrapnel to the neck,” he said. “Had it not been for the two guys in my truck I would have died.”
Cutburth spent three weeks in Walter Reed Hospital and during that time, his friend had sent the word out that he had been injured.
Oh said he heard that Cutburth was injured and they connected again when he got out of the army in 2006.
Looking Forward To A New Start
After serving in the military, Oh went back to college and then started working as a Journalist for the Korea Economy Daily, which is the equivalent of the Wall Street Journal.
“I worked in the media group as the project manager writing articles for the internet,” Oh said. “I just quit two months ago and took some vacation.”
He has received offers from other news agencies and some business offers as well but Oh will sort them out later.
Cutburth said that the fact that Oh served as a KATUSA soldier opens many doors in the job market.
But for the next few weeks he will enjoy connecting again with his friend. Plans are to attend a family reunion and learn more about the American culture. He may take a trip to Chicago or another city.
Just Like Family
Oh is also reconnecting with Will’s wife Stephanie and meeting their kids on the trip. Both said Oh played a big part in helping with a location for proposal made when Stephanie visited Korea in 2003.
“Oh helped me plan out the place to propose,” Cuthbert said. “She landed on May 1 and the next day we went to the top of Namsan Tower and I proposed there. I had to ask twice, she was stunned so I asked again and then we thought it made more sense to just get married before she went home.”
So he was very instrumental in making sure we got married.
“He’s just like family to me,” Oh said. “Just like my big brother.”
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Posted by admin
on Sep 28 2011. Filed under News and Updates.
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