"Are you stupid? You can't walk the streets with an open beer can in your hand."
"I've seen others do it. I'm not paying."
"Suit yourself.
They put him into the car and chased other criminals throughout the night. When they had a couple more rounded up, including Sang Huin himself, they took all three of them to the police office for paperwork and then far away into the dusty bluffs where there was a jail. The cells were underground and they were wet and cold like a cellar. The bunks were just metal without any mattresses, sheets, or blankets and the prison guards inserted sharp instruments into the rectums of the alleged culprits.
When he woke from a coughing fit, he noticed that all of his things were gone including the little case that had his passport and the pocket pc that contained his novel about Gabriele. "Dear God, no!" he thought. Only bits of previous drafts were on diskettes in Seoul. His only copy of Gabriele was in that pocket pc. He felt as if he were living in a shadowy nightmare as sharp as a migraine. He quickly dressed himself and went into the lobby. When he saw that same night attendant sleeping on his chair it suddenly occurred to him that it had not been this man who had entered his room but someone else of similar but not identical looks. He wasn't sure who it had been—so greedy had been his need for blind sex. He went back into his room and beat on his head in self-flagellation. He felt lost and dizzy. He felt as a lost speck of dust blowing about in space and time. He curled up in a fetal position on the bed and wept. His head ached and he fell asleep once again. He dreamed that won, pesos, and dollars were freefalling from the skies and striking animals and humans within the rain of capitalism. Then he dreamed that he was dematerializing from one country and materializing into another. No sooner would he be memorizing buildings and mapping out familiarities in his mind when he would suddenly be someplace else. People in each of these countries would ask him who he was and where he came from. He had amnesia and could not tell them anything and they just looked at him with deep sympathy.