My Liberation Notes Episode 4: The Desolate Yeom Family

In My Liberation Notes episode 4, Kim Ji-won tries to break away from her mundane life and she has a newfound hope. As her brother says, Gyeonggi-do is like the white part of the egg surrounding the yellow part that is Seoul. The siblings are tired of living not too close and not too far from Seoul but they find it unreasonable to move to a new place just two hours away from their home. They live in a family of five in the village of Sanpo in the Gyeonggi district. My Liberation Notes (나의 해방일지) is a Korean drama series directed by Kim Suk-yoon and stars Kim Ji-won, Lee Min-ki, Son Suk-ku and Lee El, alongside other cast members.

Yeom Je-ho is head of the Yeom family and father to Gi-jeong, Chang-hee and Mi-jeong. He is a full-time farmer and also makes kitchen sinks. He is a conservative person who fulfils his duty to his family by providing them with food and shelter. He is not the one to show affection and is always quiet. Their family has the rule to have dinner together when everyone is home but they barely speak with each other while eating. He doesn’t take financial risks and neither lets his children do so, reason why his children hide many things from him.

Je-ho’s wife, Hye-suk is the reason why their family is sticking together. Like most mothers, her children can freely talk to her more than their father. Although it is not some big or serious talk about their lives, the children still share more words with their mother than their father. The children, specifically Chang-hee gets into an argument with his father a lot and more often than not, his mother is the one who meddles and stops the matter from growing big. Hye-suk always jumbles between trying to handle her kids’ and husband’s moods.

The eldest daughter of the Yeom family, Gi-jeong works at an Analytics company in Seoul. She has been working the same job for 10 years and has become a team leader. However, her boss still ignores her. She is unhappy with the same old life and gets annoyed over little things. She was uneasy about the fact that her boss gave lottery tickets to everyone but her until she confronted the boss about it.

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Gi-jeong tries to find her happiness in beauty treatments but what she really wants and does not seem to get is love. She is the type to fall for personality than looks and that is why she always shows her real personality on blind dates but that intimidates the men. She wishes to live in Seoul but can’t bring herself to do that.

Yeom Chang-hee is the middle child with hot temperament. He had taken a loan before which his father had to pay off and that disappointed his father. He is frustrated about everything in his life- his village, his job, his ex-girlfriend and himself. He whines every night to make his mother turn on the AC. He has one friend in the village and goes to his empty cafe to sit under the AC. The only way to calm down his fuming mind is the AC. Chang-hee’s girlfriend called him old-fashioned and he broke up with her before she could so as to not feel humiliated. He has a lot piled up inside him but has no one to talk to.

Mi-jeong is the youngest member of the family and she is quiet and introverted just like her father. She works an ordinary job during the week and works diligently at her family farm on the weekend. She speaks less, at home and at work as well. She always has to refuse her colleagues to hang out after work because she has to catch the train back to Sanpo. She hasn’t joined any club in her office and she is getting calls to join any one of them. She doesn’t have time and neither does she find any of the clubs amusing.

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Mi-jeong’s life is boring and she finds no meaning in it. She has only dated men who didn’t care about her and treated her like a pushover. However, she finds herself trying to change after she meets Mr. Gu, her father’s employee. Mr. Gu is also quite like her and looks as pitiful as her. Their conversation starts when she asks him to hide the debt notice from her family. He helps her but also gives her a reality check. Mi-jeong’s boring life has got a little refreshment with Mr. Gu’s arrival.

The Yeom family is not a typical family portrayed in Kdramas. They are not emotionally close to each other, except for the siblings who have a little more bonding with each other than they have with their parents. They do not crack jokes or taunt each other and break into a burst of happy laughter; the mood at their home is rather gloomy.

The siblings leave home early and come back late and during the day, the parents work at their farm or the workshop. Their home is just a place where they stay during the weekend and sleep during the week. All of them live a separate life of their own. The siblings want to move to Seoul, not only because of the daily commuting but also because it is a more lively place than their lonely home in Sanpo.

My Liberation Notes is available to watch on Netflix.

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