Leprosy sufferers return for hometown visit after 40 years

Patients living at Sungsimwon on a trip to Samcheonpo, South Gyeongsang Province. Photo courtesy of Sungsimwon

Many were shunned by their families; others will reunite with siblings, children

Leprosy patients forced to leave their hometown by their families and residents there will get a chance to visit their homes after nearly four decades.

Leprosy sufferers living at Sungsimwon, a treatment facility run by a Franciscan monastery in Sancheong, South Gyeongsang Province, and whose hometowns are near Seoul, will have the opportunity to visit on December 27.

Of the about 200 leprosy patients residing at the facility, about 10 that grew up in the Seoul metropolitan area will be going on the visit trip. Voluntary sponsors at the Seoul metropolitan civic group center helping the monastery arrange the trip offered shelter and meals to the patients so they could stay overnight, but the group insisted on only a one-day visit because they balked at showing their appearance to too many people.

One 82-year-old patient at the monastery is not sleeping well these days. He has missed his two daughters dearly. He knows they suffered growing up, as they were ostracized by their classmates and residents of the village because their father was a sufferer of leprosy. They are now married, and he will get to see them on his visit.

A 60-year-old patient - the youngest patient at Sungsimwon - cannot wait to meet his brother. The two brothers have conversed on the phone once or twice a year. The two brothers feel a pain in their heart just thinking of the idea of ``family." This is true for many patients at Sungsimwon, as their family considers them dead, as their family members would have trouble finding spouses if it were discovered that a relative is a leprosy sufferer.

Others in this situation are heading to Seoul, anyway, to see how their hometown region has changed. Since they cannot visit their relatives' homes because they failed to keep in contact with their families, they will visit Namsan Tower in central Seoul to take in a view of the city.

Im Jae-sun of Sungsimwon said that the monastery has provided the home-visit program since April. "It is very hard for the patients to talk about their family and hometown," he said, "but one day I heard a patient say that he wanted to visit the place where he had played when he was young. I really think the patients want to go back, despite thier silence about the issue." As most of the patients at Sungsimwon are getting old, this visit to their home may be their last. Four out of 90 who participated in the trips this year have already passed away, he said.

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