A hosteller 4

   Hosteller

2. Mustache

         1

In his 20s Moon spent 4 years of life under medical treatment in a sanatorium.

Reflecting on the life in isolation, he often thought that he had experienced

a journey to an exotic land which was not likely to be in the world. There

he slept seeing through the window of his room cherry flowers 

in full blossom and the next day he awoke to find the flowers all gone.

In the evening he went to bed again seeing the flowers in full bloom and

again the next day he was sad to find them all gone. It was thought that

he dreamed a long dream in which he saw through the window 4 times

just for consecutive nights a phenomenon that the cherry flowers bloomed

and were all gone in a moment and left the land of cherry flowers.

The sanatorium hides itself at the  thick-forested hill side, so the winter

was relatively cold. More than anything else, most patients suffering

from the irregular fluctuation of their body temperature were sensitive

to the weather in fear of getting cold, which possibly caused the horrible

cough. However, After sunset when it was snowy or thickly cloudy , 

the corridor of the old structure, built of wood began to liven up,

with the electric light on, assuming  a picturesque look 

against the dark woods outside. 

There he happened to grow a mustache. At first it came to grow

by itself, as he did not shave while he was lying unmoved in bed

in fear of blood-spitting again. one day shaving himself in a mirror, 

he wanted to have the hairs under the nose unshaved. He thought

if he had a mustache resembling that of Nietzsche. how nice

it would be! Under such a simple reason with some curiosity

he left the hairs on his upper lip.With it as a momentum he had

a mustache in the sanatorium.

He was lucky to know that while he was trimming up his mustache 

he could forget the unbearable sufferings of breathing itself.

He embellished it every morning before the mirror enjoying to see it grow ,

which resulted in temporarily stopping the fearful cough forget 

the suffering of the unbearable coughs .

At that time he had no other hope but to easily breath in.

When he awoke up, the first thing to do or his daily life was 

to check by himself how the sound of his breathing was,

in other words, whether or not the sound of it got better

than yesterday. And You can imagine the next things which he did 

carefully one by one.That is to say, when he awoke in the morning,

he began to cough several times slightly, still in bed,for the purpose

of pulling up to the throat the phlegm which was amassed the last night

in the upper part of both chests and spits it all out into the phlegm bottle.

After confirming that there was no blood stain mixed in it,

he went out to the washroom  having a fit of coughing, 

If there was found a trace oft blood in phlegm, which could be

a sign of lung hemorrhage, he lay again in bed ,with a thermometer

put beneath the tongue, in fear of expected coughing up blood.

In this sense, it was not just for purpose of washing up that

every morning he went to the washroom .More than that, it was 

to inform others of his being well, with no problem through the last night.  

On the one hand, more importantly the mustache let him look

charismatic and authoritative to 2 men patients in the ward

where he was: one, Mr.Guago deaf-half mute, and the other,

Tango dancer, tall and slender. Both of them entered to hospital

almost the same time

A week or so after the two patients passed over their serious condition,

they began to step out of the sick room, first to the corridor in front of

the door of his room and next to the resting room located farther

at the end of it, as most newcomers did that way. Anyway when the two

newcomers came to meet him, they paid their respects to him,

with their eyes fixed on his upper lip. Mr.Guago in particular was

polite, in the obedient manner,to him due to his mustache.

Then in a month or so Mr.Guago suddenly turned his attitude to him 

from respect into disdain,even making fun of him before men and women

in grape-colored mantle. It might be related with a reason that

Mr.Guago's attitude turned abruptly to the opposite : One day, 

Mr. Guago happened to be in the bathroom together with him and 

while Moon and Mr. Guago sat side by side, naked, 

on the bathroom floor, the latter suggested  to  the former

that he should wash off the dirt on his back. Rubbing his back softly, 

Mr.Guaga got disappointed at his skinny body. Then this was also 

the moment his mustache lost its authoritative power to make Mr.Guago

be polite. Next he began to measure by his hand Moon's wrist,

ankle and neck one after another smoothly. After that, 

Mr. Guago was sure that Moon was nothing and he himself was superior

to Moon and since the moment on, treated him as if he were his Sancho

in the novel of Don Quixote. For example, Mr.Guaga liked to walk

through the long corridor to the resting hall grasping him with one hand 

by the coat collar around his back neck with a purpose: to show

to the group of patients, in particular women patients that he was 

physically superior to Moon. In such a method, Mr. Guago liked

to pride himself by comparing his splendid physique with that

of Moon

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