My hometown is Gwangju.(South Korea, Jeolla Province)
I was born and raised in Gwangju, and even around the time I graduated from university, I thought I would live there for the rest of my life.
When I returned after living abroad about a year before graduation, it seemed that my major and experience had lost demand in my hometown, much like how people lost interest in Nokia after Steve Jobs announced the iPhone.
Like a diligent young person in modern Korean society, I quickly revised my self-introduction to fit the job posting and wrote interview scripts that adults would appreciate. Before I knew it, I came to the realization that “I probably won’t have any reason to live in Gwangju anymore.”
And now, I have no reason to go back to my hometown, nor do I have a strong desire to return.
Nevertheless, the scent of my hometown still lingers in my mind from time to time. This includes the neighborhood izakaya where I could lean on and rest since I was twenty, high school reunions, and the jazz club in the old town that has long maintained its weekend live music. The jams I listened to cluelessly as a child, the Jazz Live I could only listen to until the subway stopped running because I had no money, and the Martinis and B&Bs I ordered on impulse because I couldn’t bring myself to give them up despite everything.
These memories of hometown jazz often linger in my mind as nostalgia.