96. Five on three
Three weeks later, on the 13th of August.
“Jeong-ho, are you okay? I can’t seem to eat much today… . Aren’t you sick?”
I said with a smile on my mother’s worried expression.
“no. If you ate a bowl of rice, you ate enough, huh.”
“Just yesterday, when I sat down at the table, I ate two bowls at once… Maybe it’s because there’s no meat side dishes today… ?”
“haha–! No, Mom. I’m not old enough to complain about side dishes… Oh yeah.”
To be precise, it’s not that I haven’t eaten much today, it’s that I ate too much until yesterday.
I ate an average of five meals a day for the past three weeks, and I ate two bowls of rice at each meal, so it was natural for my mother to be worried today.
It was exactly 19 days ago that I received about 8,000 photos from Secretary Seo Eun-young.
The 17 CDs she handed over contained photos of the faces of 1,193 old people in their youth, middle age, and present.
The total number of photo files was 8117, and about 5-7 photos per person were organized by folder.
The first task I started was to input 8117 face images into my head.
Then, it took exactly two weeks to analyze each 8117 face images and find common patterns of change.
Excluding sleeping and eating time, he spent 18 out of 24 hours a day analyzing facial images in his head.
After a week passed, the facial aging patterns were sorted out one by one, and the main changes are as follows.
First, as the cheekbones under the eyes rise, wrinkles around the eyes are created, and at the same time, the eyes begin to look like they are sunken.
At this time, the thinner the person, the faster the pitting of the eyes becomes. In the case of a face with developed cheekbones, this pattern progresses relatively slowly, even for a skinny person.
Second, the nose is lowered as the pharynx sags downward. Contrary to the first characteristic, skin sagging progresses more slowly as the skin is thinner.
Third, the chin and around the mouth recede to the back of the face, and the area around the mouth and cheeks sink down.
This characteristic is common to all people regardless of body type, and progresses rapidly after the late 50s.
Fourth, in the case of men, there is a characteristic that the nose becomes longer after the age of 50, and this change appears more conspicuously as the shape of the face becomes rounder.
Fifth, as the eyebrows descend, the outer eyelids flow downwards.
This phenomenon begins at an early age as the eyes become smaller, and in people with large eyes, it does not progress until the late 60s.
Sixth, the chin begins to flow downward, and this pattern progressed faster in people with a fat body.
We were able to find a total of 19 face change patterns including these, and we were able to quantify the speed at which these patterns progressed according to gender, body type, face shape, chin length, cheekbone height, eye size, and lip thickness. .
read at noblemtl.com
Numericalized patterns were prepared as formulas according to each condition, and a beta version of the program for finding separated families was made using the prepared formulas.
In order to run the program, an algorithm that extracts necessary information from a given face image was needed, and this part had to be done with the help of In-cheol in Japan.
Without Incheol’s help, the beta version could not have been completed in just two days.
I sent the completed beta program to Secretary Eun-Young Seo, and I also started testing the program.
The test method is simple.
It is using the image I received from Secretary Eun-Young Seo two weeks ago.
First, by inputting images of their youth into the beta version program, they predicted the face of 50 years later, and compared the predicted face images of 1193 people with the current photos on the CD.
I expected this work to be finished soon, but I ran into a more difficult problem than I expected.
The missing child program, developed three years ago when Eunseong was found, is used to predict how the face of a 5-year-old child will change after the age of 15.
Between the ages of 5 and 15, the child’s skeleton itself grows, so the degree of change in the face is large.
However, the pattern that changed over time did not differ significantly from person to person.
This means that the rate at which faces change is the same for all children.
However, the aging process of an adult’s face was the exact opposite.
There was no major change in the overall frame of the face, but the rate of change varied from person to person.
I pondered this problem for days and nights, and it was surprisingly easily solved.
I was talking on the phone with Secretary Seo Eun-young last night.
Hearing my explanation, she said in an indifferent voice.
This means that the image that comes out of running the program does not necessarily have to be one.
As Secretary Seo Eun-young said, the program was able to complete the search for separated families by showing three predictive images in the case of rapid, slow, and average facial aging.
After analyzing the aging process of 1,200 people’s faces, excluding the time they slept and ate for nearly three weeks, the changing faces began to be drawn automatically in their minds.
It is a kind of conditional reflex.
For example, if you look at the face of a person you see for the first time while walking down the street, the face of that person 50 years later is drawn in front of your eyes.
The reverse was also possible. Looking at the face of an old or middle-aged man, we could predict his youthful face by time period.
A mother who says she is worried about the amount she eats.
I looked at my mother’s face and said.
“Mom.”
“yes?”
“When Mom was young, I think she must have been really pretty.”
At my words, my mother smiled and said.
“He really… Now there is nothing I can’t say.”
“Really.”
Towards the end of the meal, the mother opened her mouth with a serious expression.
“By the way, when is In-cheol coming from Japan?”
“Originally, we were supposed to come this weekend, but I think we postponed our flight tickets back to early September.”
“I see. Then I can’t see In-cheol, is it okay?”
Seeing my mother’s sad expression on her face, I smiled and said.
“There’s no seat in the car, but it’s good, huh.”
Five days later, August 18th is my enlistment day.
I was going to go to Nonsan by Sangsu’s car, but since there are four people including my uncle, my mother, and Yeongmi and I, it meant that there was no room for Incheol in the car.
But even if you say this… .
To be honest, I’m very sorry.
He’s the best friend I’ve been with for the past 7 years, but when I think of going to the military without saying goodbye properly, a bitter taste lingers in my mouth.
On the 16th, the end of the Liberation Day holiday, Yeong-mi and Ji-eun decided to meet Ji-eun, and at that time, I decided to talk to In-cheol on the phone to appease the disappointment.
Mother cleared the table and opened her mouth.
“Hey Jungho… .”
“yes?”
“… … .”
“why? Mom.”
“By the way… Are you really okay with cleaning the house? You were born and raised in this house, wouldn’t it be a shame?”
“it’s okay.”
The mother nodded silently, and hesitated to bring up something.
I know what my mother is talking about now.
A few days ago, I got a phone call from Uncle Sang-soo, and that day he told his mother that he was preparing a proposal once again.
I got up and hugged my mother tightly.
So, holding her mother, she opened her mouth.
“I want my mom to be happy and not lonely.”
“… .”
“and… If you have a reliable companion by your side… While in the military, I will feel very at ease.”
“Yes, thank you for understanding, son.”
I said, helping my mother clean the table with me.
“Still, if we clean up our apartment, you must let us know.”
“What do you mean?”
“One of my seniors from school went to the military, and after taking his first vacation, he went back to his hometown, and there were other people living there.”
“… ?”
“I heard that my parents moved after that hyung enlisted, but they didn’t tell him that he moved.”
My mother smirked at my words, and at the same time the phone in my pocket rang.
When I pressed the call button, I heard my father’s voice on the other side of the phone.
-Jungho, are you free on Monday?
“The 15th?”
-yes.
“I have an appointment for dinner. Other than that, I’m fine.”
-Then why don’t you go to COEX with Aunt Joo-hee that day?
“Is it COEX?”
-Yes, there is a reunion dinner for separated families at COEX, but I have an urgent business on Monday, so it seems difficult to go together.
“… .”
– Aunt Joo-hee said that I would be very nervous if I went there, but I wondered what it would be like to be next to you… .”
Monday 15 August.
A total of 83 round tables were prepared at the event hall in COEX, and the South Korean families who arrived earlier sat at the designated tables and waited for the North Korean reunion.
Table 71 was assigned to me and Aunt Joo-hee, and there were a total of three South Korean reunions including Aunt Joo-hee.
There was a family at the table with a reunion like me, and it was strangely… .
I could tell at a glance who was meeting the family in the north, and who was the family that followed me.
It was the same for the people sitting at the other tables, but those waiting for their families in the north… .
Each of them had a recalled face that was a mixture of anticipation and tension.
“Ahh! Ahh! mic test! Microphone test!”
The eyes of all the people in the venue turned to the stage in front of the venue.
He seemed to be the person in charge of today’s reunion event.
On the podium, he took the microphone and opened his mouth.
“Please pay attention for a moment!”
He explained the full schedule of the upcoming reunion event, and soon after meeting with the North Korean family, he began to tell them one by one about things to keep in mind.
The instructions were the same as in the brochure I received yesterday.
It was not to talk about criticizing the North Korean system, and not to express negative opinions even if the North Korean family praised Kim Il-sung and Kim Jong-il.
After the warning was delivered, I got up and looked around the venue.
A week ago, Secretary Eun-Young Seo clearly said this:
A person named Ri Yeon-hee is included in the list of North Koreans visiting Seoul.
As I walked around the venue, I checked each table one by one, but I couldn’t find Professor Park Bo-soo’s figure.
I shook my head while trying to call Professor Park directly.
If you are not here right now, it means that you have been rejected for some other reason, because I felt there was no need to contact me and ask.
That was then.
Someone tapped my shoulder, and I turned and looked back.
“… ?”
“you… Jung-ho is right!”
“Perhaps… Teacher, are you a professor?”
At my words, Professor Park Bosu smiled and nodded.
“Wow! professor… ! I really thought I was a different person!”
I used to think that Professor Park’s eyes were small, but this must be because of the professor’s glasses.
The professor had his hair cut short and neatly parted, and his thick beard was also neatly shaved.
I continued with a thumbs up.
“Professor, you look really cool. You look 40 years younger.”
“haha-! Looking younger… .”
Professor Park spoke with a shy expression on his face.
“By the way… What are you doing here?”
“My stepmother, whom my father married, is meeting with my northern family this time. Originally, my father was going to come with me, but something happened and I came.”
“okay… I see.”
“Professor, then… Are you meeting the person you mentioned at that time, Yeon-hee?”
Professor Park nodded with a smile on his face.
Looking at Professor Park’s smiling face… .
The young face of the professor was drawn in front of him.
Wow… ! Professor Park was also a very handsome man.
Then an announcement came through the speaker.
It was a broadcast that said that a bus carrying the North Korean reunion had arrived.
I asked Professor Park.
“Professor, where is the table?”
“It’s number 47. Where are you?”
“We are number 71.”
“I see. Then see you later.”
“yes. Have a good time.”
“okay.”
After breaking up with the professor, I went out of the event hall to go to the bathroom, and there were a lot of reporters camped out in the hallway.
While I was washing my hands after doing my chores in the bathroom, I heard a familiar voice from behind.
“Man, to be a good journalist, the ability to make a scoop is more important than finding it! Watch and learn how I am doing today! okay?”
“Yes, sir!”