A Mother No Matter Whatby Michele Cheplic | More from this Blogger 28 Jul 2009 08:40 AM A mother is a mother is a mother regardless of whether she is on a business trip 6,000 miles away from home or whether her "baby" joins the military and is deployed to the middle of nowhere... or if she's doing time in a North Korean labor camp. The latter situation is what Euna Lee is dealing with right now. Lee is an American journalist and mother of an adorably cute 4-year-old daughter with her husband Michael. She is also the colleague of Laura Ling, whose sister Lisa was a former member of ABC's "The View" and current investigative correspondent for "The Oprah Winfrey Show." Euna Lee and Laura Ling were recently sentenced to 12 years in a labor camp in North Korea following their arrest in March near the China-North Korea border. It's unclear whether the female journalists tried to sneak into North Korea or if aggressive border guards crossed into Chinese territory and grabbed them, as has happened before. According to the BBC, Ling and Lee were reporting about the trafficking of women at the time of their arrest. Interestingly, their cameraman and local guide were able to escape while border guards kept a firm hold on Ling and Lee. North Korean officials accused the female reporters of unspecified "hostile acts" and illegally entering the country, which is considered a "grave crime." The women were put on trial, convicted and sentenced to 12 years of "reform through hard labor." As you might expect communication between Lee and her family has been severely limited. Lee's husband, who has spoken to the media only briefly since his wife's sentencing, revealed that their daughter Hana cries at night for her mommy. The girl hasn't seen her mother in four months and doesn't know when they will be reunited. In the meantime, Lee is reportedly devastated that her absence is causing Hana so much pain. However, she remains steadfast to mothering from a far. In a move that would break any parent's heart, the imprisoned mom illustrated why a mother is a mother no matter what. According to reports, a couple of weeks ago Michael received an urgent message from Euna at their home in California. Apparently, Hana's mommy begged guards to pass her message onto the Swedish Ambassador, who has been the women's only outside contact. The Swedish Ambassador then passed on the message to the U.S. State Department, who then contacted Michael. So what did this "urgent" message contain? According to Michael, Euna wanted to make sure he had sent in Hana's summer school registration forms. Michael says Euna spent a lot of time choosing a Korean immersion school for her daughter, and was scared her husband would forget to send in the forms before the due date. Classic! Euna is imprisoned in a foreign country a half a world away from her family, slaving away at laborious tasks, and yet her first priority is her daughter. No matter how adequate Euna's husbands may be, she's still like most moms and worries that he will forget important tasks. Sound familiar? A mother's work is never done. Related Articles: Learn more about Michele Cheplic  Michele Cheplic was born and raised in Hilo, Hawaii, but now lives in Wisconsin. Michele graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a degree in Journalism. Relevantparenting tags User Comments FitToTheFinish (15) 29 Jul 2009 05:38 AMWow! That's amazing and sad. It's true though. I've been visiting family, and called my hubby to remind him to give our son his medicine! Our kids are always in our minds, no matter where we are!  Michele Cheplic |
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