Bae Chun-hui

Bae Chun-hui (1923 – 2014)
born in Seongju, Gyeongsangbuk-do, South Korea

In 1942, at the age of eighteen, one day when she was spending time with her friend Bongsun, she heard about a local recruitment for the Women’s Voluntary Labor Corps.  There she was told she could earn money, but not that she would be forced into sex work, and so she and Bongsun volunteered together. But she was taken to Manchuria, and forced into sexual slavery for the Japanese military.  After the end of the war, she was unable to return directly to Korea, and after remaining for six years in now-Chinese Manchuria, she crossed to Japan in 1951.  She remained there for just over thirty years and returned to Korea in 1981. She lived at the House of Sharing and passed away in 2014.

Bae Chunhui, who was a cabaret singer in Japan, always sings like a professional; at the House of Sharing, she is considered an artist.  Grandmother Bae, who doesn’t open her heart easily to others, falls quickly and deeply for animals and children.  She loves melodramatic songs and movies and romantic content.

Her song, “Dance Song of Youth,” was originally a Chinese folksong, but it was sung by the female lead of the Chinese melodramatic film Susanna (1967), which made a hit and is well known throughout Korea.

Dance Music of Youth (1938)

Chinese folk tune adapted and arranged by Wang Luo-bin
Korean/Chinese version 1970 (translated by Kim Hak-song)
Vocals: Li Ching and Jeong Hun-hui

(Chinese)

The sun descends over the mountain and rises the next morning
Flowers wither and bloom again the same way next year
The beautiful baby bird flies away without a trace
Just like the baby bird, the spring of my youth doesn’t return.
Just like the baby bird, the spring of my youth doesn’t return.
This mustn’t be so…this mustn’t be so—
The spring of my youth flies away like the bird and doesn’t return.

(Korean)

The sun rises again
Flowers bloom again with the coming of spring.
But like the baby bird, who flies up and goes far,
The spring of my youth does not return,
The spring of my youth does not return.

(Chinese)

This mustn’t be so…this mustn’t be so.

(Korean)

The spring of my youth does not return