"The word "nowhere,' if separated into "now" and "here,' becomes "now here.' Difference can be made upon the same situation, depending on how one perceives it."
   Having served as the Policy advisor of the National Council on Disability of the U.S. White House, the highest position a Korean has ever reached in the U.S. federal government, he was the first blind Korean to earn a doctorate. Moreover, he was grandly registered in a world-renowned biographical dictionary "Who's Who in the World" and was elected by the Roosevelt Foundation as one of 127 persons who contributed to humanity. His name is Kang Young-woo.
   In a conversation for a radio broadcast, Dr. Kang boldly responded with ingenuous expression and energetic laughs, making it hard to believe that he was blind.
   Having lost his father at the age of 14, he lost his sight a year later when he got hit on the face by a soccer ball. His mother died in shock and his sister, who gave up her studies to become a bread-winner for her orphaned younger siblings, passed away from overwork. All of a sudden, young Kang became the head of the family in his teens - he was separated from his younger siblings who were sent to the orphanage while he was sent to a rehabilitation center for the disabled. He could not even live with his siblings because he was blind.
   There can hardly be any life harsher than this one. If one has disability, there is family; if one does not have family, then one has a normal body.
   Kang spent everyday in despair, praying to be able to see, when one day, a pastor helped him change his mind to "Thank the ten things he has, instead of complaining about the one he does not have." Afterwards he lived life actively, hardly seeming like a disabled. Having gone through times of lostness in his adolescence, he started to study a few years later than others of his age, but was not granted admission to school at first because he was blind. Yet, he got into Yonsei Univ. in the end and graduated Col. of Liberal Arts with second highest rank; also, because he was not admitted to participate in a school club activity, he started a new one by himself.
   How Dr. Kang could overcome all this prejudice and disability and achieve such scholarly attainments that even the able-bodied can hardly think of, along with an honorable position in the world, is probably the power of the "Nowhere? Now here" spirit that he had mentioned.
   If someone questions, "Because you lost your eyesight" Dr. Kang replies at once that he could get to a high status in the White House and live a life that can impress many people not "because of" but "thanks to" the blindness.
   If you think the conditions of your life are unfortunate, why not think of the life of "young Kang Young-woo" for a moment and reflect upon yourself? If you would only discard the thought of "nowhere" and change your way of thinking to "now here" right away!

Lee Jeong-ok (News Commentator, KBS)