As the flower-bedecked South Korean locomotive chugged out of the sparkling Dorasan Station into the low, green hills of the demilitarised zone (DMZ) last month, it sounded its horn triumphantly.
The echoes were euphoric. 'Peninsula's spine reconnected,' roared one South Korean daily after the May 17 event. 'Iron horse runs road to reunification,' headlined another. 'Korean peninsula's pulse flows again,' blared yet another.
The test runs of inter-Korean railways - the first since the Korean war - generated a storm in a South Korean media more used to reporting the apparently intractable nuclear standoff with Pyongyang. And it was not just trains. On May 21, a commercial shipping service began between the two nations for the first time in more than half a century.
Now that the excitement has cooled, questions are being raised about whether the events were merely a symbolic boost for Seoul's shaky engagement policy with the North, or a stepping stone to agreements that will, after half a century of division, grant South Korea access to the Asian landmass and generate momentum for deeper inter- Korean rapprochement.
Amid the tense military activity and stunning natural beauty of the DMZ, one of the most potent symbols of national division lies rusting: a railway locomotive, stranded forever between the two Koreas. Given this, the test run was emotional for many.
'I left Pyongyang when I was 13, losing my entire family,' said Song Yong-kil, 73, a pensioner who travelled from Seoul to Munsan Station, the northbound train's starting point. 'I came here today as I yearn for my home town. I'm so glad.' Two trains ran. One, from South to North, ran on the western Gyeongui Line to the city of Kaesong, just across the border. Brass bands, traditional musicians, politicians, and crowds of schoolchildren and senior citizens came to wish it well as it set out from Munsan Station for Dorasan, the southern customs post on the DMZ, and the North.