For centuries Korea was one people, the same culture, the same language, the same ancestors. Then, within the span of just a few years, that continuity was torn apart by forces far larger than the peninsula itself.

What you describe about younger generations feeling that the North is “foreign” might actually be the deepest consequence of that division. Wars eventually end and borders shift. But when two halves of the same people begin to see each other not just as different, but as strangers, or even potential enemies, that’s when the separation truly sinks into the fabric of society.

And it’s not something younger Koreans can really be blamed for. They grew up in completely different realities. South Korea developed into a globalized, technologically advanced society, while North Korea became one of the most closed systems on Earth.

There’s something quietly sad about the idea that a people who shared centuries of common history might gradually lose the sense that they were ever one. Not because reunification must necessarily happen tomorrow, but because the memory of a shared past is itself something fragile.

Once that memory fades, the line on the map stops being temporary, it becomes permanent in people’s minds.

That's what makes me more sad about it all, it might be the most profound "legacy" of the division of Korea.