6:30 a.m. — The Courtyard of Ginkgo Lane 🔍

At 6:30 a.m. in the narrow courtyard of our Ginkgo Lane house, I dipped a brass basin into the water jar and washed while sparrows quarreled along the tiled eaves. Mother set out barley rice, salted cucumber, and a thin soybean-paste soup, and the steam made my face warmer still. Since this is my first morning here, I watched her hands closely and copied every household habit so no one would notice my uncertainty. I changed into a white cotton blouse and dark pleated skirt, then wrapped my books and lunch tin in a faded cloth. Before leaving, I helped fan the charcoal brazier until its red center brightened and promised to bring home lamp oil if the shop still had some. Outside the gate, cicadas shrilled so loudly that the whole lane seemed to tremble.

11:50 a.m. — The Shaded School Corridor 🔍

At 11:50 a.m. in the shaded wooden corridor of Camellia Girls’ School, I sat beside an open window with my lunch tin balanced on my knees. The classroom behind me smelled of chalk, old floor oil, hot cotton uniforms, and the black ink drying in our copybooks. My desk mate, Sun-ja, traded me a strip of pickled radish for half of my barley-rice ball and whispered that she would meet me at the stationery stall after lessons. During penmanship I pressed too hard with the steel nib, and a dark bead of ink spread across the cheap paper like a tiny storm cloud. I blotted it with scrap paper before the teacher passed, though Sun-ja saw and hid a smile behind her hand. When the noon heat settled over the roof, even the cicadas seemed tired, and I wished for one cup of shaved ice more than anything.

6:20 p.m. — Willow Market Street 🔍

At 6:20 p.m. on Willow Market Street, I stepped aside as an electric streetcar rattled past, its bell sharp above the calls of vegetable sellers packing their baskets. Sun-ja and I counted our small coins twice before buying a shared bowl of shaved ice streaked with sweet red-bean syrup from a hand-cranked stall. The metal spoon was cold against my fingers, and for a few minutes the day’s heat loosened its grip on my neck and back. At the oil shop I filled Mother’s stoppered bottle, then tucked it upright inside my cloth book bundle so it would not leak. We paused by a stall of notebooks, combs, thread, and tin toys, but I bought only two steel pen nibs and kept the remaining coins knotted in my handkerchief. By the time I turned into Ginkgo Lane, the western sky was peach-colored, kitchen smoke hung between the roofs, and I no longer felt entirely like a stranger in this day.