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... My daily life was boring and meaningless before being a member of the *GUERNICA. However, the activities in my changed my life to an active and busier one. After the accident, I had just lived alone in my room without saying a word, but now it is different. Through these activities, I am living another life, a more interesting and hopeful life. Oh! One of the greatest presents from GUERNICA is that I regained my words and began to talk actively with my friends heart to heart. Nowadays, it is a very big happiness for me to go to the cinema or bar like other normal students. I also regained the sympathy of the people that had been forgotten for so long a time; their hearts are warm! From all of these, however, the change of my thoughts themselves was the biggest present for me: if the society doesn? accept you, do not run away from it, but face the situation. In these days, we are facing a monstrously huge door closed to death in front of us. We, the disabled persons, should not be frustrated and give up, but open with our own hands and finally pass through it. I have come to recognize that we, contemporary people of the present era, should share this burden of the times...
A diary from a GUERNICA
*Gernica: Dongari of the disabled in Yonsei University

There are many kinds of people with different levels and ages in our society. Society is made up of many kinds of people and organizations, and so it has become, a so-called diversified society. Most people have shouted out that diversity is very important for the development of any society, and the meaning of diversity has, maybe, already been accepted in each person? mind as a social axiom. However, the concept of diversity is not applied to all of the people of a society in reality. The majority excepts the others with differences from them, physically normal persons, from time to time. The disabled are one of the groups that suffer from a prejudice like that.

In February, the season of the university entrance exam, there were big arguments between some universities and disabled persons on the special selection for the disabled. The seed of the argument lay in the fact that most of the universities had no special selection program for the disabled. According to those school authorities, they have no room for the creation of the quota for the disabled students due to the lack of budget, facilities and even no-applicants. As a local example, there are no disabled students in the Sungkyunkwan University (SKKU) who entered it via the special selection program. Of course, SKKU has a special selection program for the disabled, but, reportedly, there has been no applicant till now. Considering its location, high altitude and steep slope, this situation at SKKU is one that can be predictable enough. In any case, a lot of the disabled students experience unfairness in person, apart from their expectance to go to a university and get a higher education just like other physically-normal students. Even at the entrance process, after all, they are deprived of one of the important basic rights, the right to learn.
?t is the hardest thing for us to pace up and down the stairs for class, and we need more time to move from class to class changing buildings than normal fellow students do. For this reason, I was restricted in my choice of classes, considering my moving line and time, before all the things above; I had no choice but to give up enrolling in the classes that I wanted to learn,?said Kim Dong-eun, an information and communication assistant in GUERNICA. He added: ?n fact, we can say that the present situation is more improved than the former school life, but the problem still remains in current campus life. For example, despite the fact that the facilities for the wheel-chair-bound students are being gradually improved, blind and deaf students still have not a few problems in living on campus.? Mr. Kim is one of the disabled students. Though its number is so small in comparison with the sum total of the students, it is undeniable that the disabled are members of the university. Just as they have a duty to pay the same tuition as the other students do, they have also a right to share the deserving opportunities with others. But in the lack of appropriate facilities and lecture programs in most universities, the disabled are deprived of their own rights based only on the fact that they are physically handicapped. As Mr. Kim mentioned above, many universities have not yet raised the type machine for translating, a machine used by the blind and deaf person. They have, of course, problems hearing and seeing. Therefore, without appropriate equipment like these machines, which are not guaranteed, they will have the big problems in understanding and going through the classes.
Another and perhaps the most urgent problem the disabled persons meet are the prejudice and the lack of understanding. Many people think that there exists a big gap between them and the disabled persons. But, if any, there is only one difference: physical inconvenience. As the recognition of human rights has spread, the recognition of the disabled has also been promoted. Nevertheless, in reality, a lot of people still have uneasiness in meeting and talking with disabled persons. This means that there still exists a somewhat undeniable gap between these two groups. Among other reasons, this results from the fact that most people do not have enough chances to meet and have good times with the disabled on a daily basis, especially in school. In this situation, with an effort to ?pen the door with their own hands?as mentioned in the introduction of this article, the disabled students try to participate in the campus activities more systematically.
Earlier this year, there arouse an argument on the special selection of the disabled persons as mentioned above. After the trouble, most of the disabled students have been proposing that the problem of the disabled should be solved by their own trial. So, the Federation of Nation-wide University Students for the Human Rights of the Disabled, consisting of eight universities in Seoul and the surrounding area, was established. On a nation-wide sca-le, there are many Dongaris such as GUERNICA for the disabled students inside and outside of the campus. For instance, GUERNICA has executed a ?aek-ri-gi?Plan, named from an ancient map, with an ob-jective to make a map for the disabled persons to enjoy their cultural lives more conveniently. At first, they visited good restaurants or pubs in the Shinchon area, which are convenient for the disabled persons to connect with. After the visits, they make a street map for other disabled students. Many people think that the disabled can? live as normal university students?life. However, this is just a prejudice. The disabled students also enjoy their school life through the activities mentioned above. With their activities, they are doing their best at reducing the normal students?prejudice toward the disabled, and the solidarity among the disabled students will thus be more strengthened.

One of the members of GUERNICA said, ?hen I meet someone the first time, most of them ask the same question. They asked what the biggest problem is for my life as a university student. I think that the question is based on prejudice toward the disabled men. Whatever other fellow students feel troublesome, we also feel this matter as the same for us. For example, an enormous campus will be a problem both for normal students and disabled students. I really want to hear that my friends and other people ask me: ?ow? your school life??or, ?hat is your favorite class?"
Like these comments, most people unconsciously think that disabled people are special people who are different from themselves. To reduce this prejudice, an endeavor on the part of both sides, the normal and the disabled, is very necessary. If understanding and respect toward the other side is settled, the problems around disabled persons will be solved. Of course, it is an essential thing that the disabled person? own will to develop their human rights remains strong. Professor of the Department of Korean Language and Literature in SKKU, Ko Jung-wook - he was one of the disabled students - said, ?t is very essential that the meeting between the normal and the disabled should be more frequent. If so, there will remain few prejudices. Seen from the situation of SKKU, it is possible to accept the disabled students. Though the location of SKKU is little bit high, the facilities are more convenient than other schools. For example, the size of the Humanities and Social Science Campus is somewhat small and most of the lecture buildings have elevators. It depends on how we approach the problem of the disabled person.? As his comments suggest, the viewpoints of the disabled students rely upon the normal person? thoughts. Therefore, when the atmosphere toward the disabled person will get ready to change, there will be no "outsider" in the case of the disabled students and they will be remained as ?"insiders"?as our good friends who are a part of in our university life.