finally a licensed driver, on the 960th try - the new york times
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10/4/2015 Finally a Licensed Driver, on the 960th Try The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/04/world/asia/04driver.html?_r=0 1/5
ASIA PACIFIC
At First She Didn’t Succeed, but She Triedand Tried Again (960 Times)SEPT. 3, 2010
The Saturday Profile
By CHOE SANGHUN
SINCHON, South Korea
A PERSON could know South Korea for a long time without knowingWanju, an obscure county 112 miles south of Seoul. And, at least until recently,a person could know a lot about Wanju without ever hearing of Cha Sasoon, a69yearold woman who lives alone in the mountainringed village of Sinchon.
Now, however, Ms. Cha is an unlikely national celebrity.
This diminutive woman, now known nationwide as “Grandma Cha Sasoon,” has achieved a record that causes people here to first shake their headswith astonishment and then smile: She failed her driver’s test hundreds oftimes but never gave up. Finally, she got her license — on her 960th try.
For three years starting in April 2005, she took the test once a day five
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days a week. After that, her pace slowed, to about twice a week. But she never
quit.
Hers is a fame based not only on sheer doggedness, a quality held in highesteem by Koreans, but also on the universal human sympathy for amonumental — and in her case, cheerful — loser.
“When she finally got her license, we all went out in cheers and huggedher, giving her flowers,” said Park Suyeon, an instructor at Jeonbuk DrivingSchool, which Ms. Cha once attended. “It felt like a huge burden falling off ourback. We didn’t have the guts to tell her to quit because she kept showing up.”
Of course, Ms. Park and another driving teacher noted, perhaps Ms. Chashould content herself with simply getting the license and not endangeringothers on the road by actually driving. But they were not too worried about therisk, they said, because it was the written test, not the driving skill and roadtests, that she failed so many times.
WHEN word began spreading last year of the woman who was still takingthe test after failing it more than 700 times, reporters traced her to Sinchon,where the bus, the only means of public transportation, comes by once everytwo hours on a street so narrow it has to pull over to let other vehicles pass.
They followed her to the test site in the city of Jeonju, an hour away.There, they also videotaped her in the market, where she sells her homegrownvegetables at an openair stall.
Once she finally got her license, in May, HyundaiKia Automotive Group,South Korea’s leading carmaker, started an online campaign asking people topost messages of congratulations. Thousands poured in. In early August,Hyundai presented Ms. Cha with a $16,800 car.
Ms. Cha, whose name, coincidentally enough, is Korean for “vehicle,” nowalso appears on a primetime television commercial for Hyundai.
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It is a big change from her noncelebrity life, spent simply in a oneroomhut with a slate roof, where the only sounds on a recent summer day were froma rainswollen brook, occasional military jets flying overhead and cicadasrioting in the nearby persimmon trees. A lone old man dozed, occasionallyswatting at flies, in a small shop next to the bus stop.
Born to a peasant family with seven children but no land, Ms. Cha spenther childhood working in the fields and studying at an informal night school. Itwas not until she turned 15 that she joined a formal school as a fourth grader.But her schooling ended there a few years later.
“Father had no land, and middle school was just a dream for me,” shesaid.
Ms. Cha said she had always envied people who could drive, but it was notuntil she was in her 60s that she got around to trying for a license.
“Here, if you miss the bus, you have to wait another two hours. Talk aboutfrustration!” said Ms. Cha, who had to transfer to a second bus to get to herdriving test site and to yet another to reach her market stall.
“But I was too busy raising my four children,” she continued. “Eventuallythey all grew up and went away and my husband died several years ago, and Ihad more time for myself. I wanted to get a driver’s license so I could take mygrandchildren to the zoo.”
Ms. Cha tackled the first obstacle, which for years proved insurmountable:the 50minute written test consisting of 40 multiplechoice questions on roadregulations and car maintenance.
Early in the morning (she wakes up 4 a.m.) and before going to bed, sheput on her reading glasses and pored over her wellworn testpreparationbooks. She first tried, unsuccessfully, an audio test for illiterate people wherequestions were read to testtakers. Later, she switched to the normal test.
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“She could read and write words phonetically but she could notunderstand most of the terminology, such as ‘regulations’ and ‘emergencylight,’ ” said Ms. Park, the teacher.
Choi Youngchul, an official at the regional driving license agency, said:“What she was essentially doing while studying alone was memorizing as manyquestions — with their answers — as possible without always knowing whatthey were all about. It’s not easy to pass the test that way.”
PRACTICE made perfect, but slowly. She failed the written test 949 times,but her scores steadily crept up. When she came to them early last year,teachers at Jeonbuk Driving School pitched in, giving her extra lessons,painstakingly explaining the terminology.
“It drove you crazy to teach her, but we could not get mad at her,” said LeeChangsu, another teacher. “She was always cheerful. She still had the little girlin her.”
It was only last November, on her 950th try, that she achieved a passinggrade of 60 out of 100. She then passed two driving skill and road tests, butonly after failing each four times. For each of her 960 tests, she had to pay $5in application fees.
“I didn’t mind,” said Ms. Cha. “To me, commuting every day to take thetest was like going to school. I always missed school.”
Her son, Park Seongju, 36, who lives in Jeonju and makes signboards andplacards, said: “Mother has lived a hard life, selling vegetables door to doorand working other people’s farms. Maybe that made her stubborn. If she putsher mind to something, no one can argue her out of it.”
About a decade ago, before embarking on her quest for a driver’s license,Ms. Cha spent three years studying for a hairdresser’s license. For six months,she caught a 6 a.m. bus every weekday, switched to a train and then to another
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bus to attend a governmentfinanced training program for hairdressers. But nobeauty salon would hire her. She was considered too old.
No matter, she said. “It was like getting a school diploma.”
Her tenacity has struck a chord with South Koreans, who are oftenexhorted to recall the hardship years after the 195053 Korean War andcelebrate perseverance as a national trait.
The country’s most popular boxing champion was Hong Suhwan, whowas floored four times before knocking out Hector Carrasquilla to win theWorld Boxing Association’s super bantamweight championship in 1977. Hisfeat gave rise to a popular phrase about resolve: “Sajeonogi,” or “Knockeddown four times, rising up five.”
Ms. Cha seems to have given new meaning to this favorite Korean saying.
On her wall where she hung blackandwhite photographs of her and herlate husband as a young couple and a watch that had stopped ticking, she alsohad posted a handwritten — and misspelled — sign that read, “Never give up!”
A version of this article appears in print on September 4, 2010, on page A6 of the New York editionwith the headline: Trying and Trying Again (960 Times) for a License.
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