So I straddle two realities. most of the weekdays,
I went to school to spend time with neighborhood
kids, none of them were really Korean, really.
Even at school, with the exception of maybe first,
second grade, there weren't very many Korean
kids there either. And I didn't really see Korean
kids at school until, again, until maybe like
junior high, at least that I was aware of or
that I hung out with. And even when I did meet
Korean kids. Like I honestly did not like them
all. It's just a longer explanation. No, my friends
actually were quite varied, depended on my neighborhood,
depended on who was around me. When I first moved
to Redlands, initially it was a large number
of white kids. Like the elementary school I went
to, just a bunch of white kids. The two that
would spend, you know, recess with me in the
monkey bars, I remember, third and fourth grade,
and then also for the rest of, honestly, elementary
school. There was a girl who was just whitey
white white. And there was another white boy
who came from a decent, it seemed like a pretty
decent background. He had a nice home. There's
another white boy that... was from Texas, family
was from Texas. When we were visiting his home,
parents had a really, really thick, thick Texas
accent, and they were never really shy about
their Texas roots. But at least in the neighborhood,
there was also this black kid who would come
over to our house regularly to play video games.
We had a console, and he had... the video game
that we wanted to play i don't know where his
console was but he had the video game and then
so he would come over and we would play with
them he'd usually completely destroy us in the
game i think that's why he enjoyed playing and
could dominate us seemed to have gotten a decent
amount of practice in um but his sister would
be there just to not play but just to like watch
um by the time i got to high school redlands
at least at the school redlands high became A
lot more diverse than at least my elementary
school. Maybe it was just always that way. I
just didn't realize. And that's how I met those
Vietnamese kids that I've mentioned before that
I've went and did activities with after school.
But I guess the people who I hung out with the
most just happened to be whoever was in the same
class or club. I was never really, I don't remember
myself being super social. And the reality was
that was just during the school week. After school,
I would go back home to Colton, and there we
didn't really hang out in the neighborhood. We
weren't really outside all that much, just because
of, unless it's like daytime on the weekends,
right? But we rarely spent time outside, especially
once it started getting dark. But most of the
people in that neighborhood were predominantly
Mexican. Latinos generally, but more often than
not, it was Mexican. The weekends were a different
world altogether. On the weekends, aside from
the occasional school or club event, I spent
most of the weekends around Korean people. On
Saturdays, it was primarily because my parents
insisted that I go to Korean school. Even into
my high school days, like that was just like
forever. I don't know why I kept on going. I
honestly was learning nothing there. I had already
learned how to speak, write, you know, read the
language. And they didn't they actually did not
even have the right level for me and for my brother.
They just started making up new grades as they
went along. But there were I didn't really have
a teacher. We actually just like I think there's
a group of there's a small group of me, like
four or five of us. who were at that level, and
we just spent that time hanging out. That's really
what we did. On Sundays, well, Sundays were,
my dad's a pastor, so Sundays were dedicated
to church all day, like all day long. I didn't
get to choose what church I attended. You know,
my dad is a pastor, so I go to my dad's church.
It was a very conservative Korean Presbyterian
church. I think my dad was actually more conservative
than the congregation members. I remember thinking
like in my mind that his his values, his mindset,
his worldview was kind of like stuck in his childhood
before he immigrated to the United States, back
when he was in the countryside of Korea, back
in the 1970s or 80s or something. I say that
because I was well aware that even the congregation
members complained that he was too stuck in his
old ways of thinking, right? Whatever that meant.
I mean, I didn't really make full sense of it,
but I do remember there were some complaints
along those lines. But what was consistent was
that I spent most of these weekends exclusively
with the Korean immigrant population, right?
all engaged in the world today, like at the time,
they were living the world as they did before
they came to the United States. In other words,
I wonder if this is just common among immigrants
generally, at least from my experience, it seemed
like they were kind of not integrating, but rather
trying to hold on to their older culture. They
felt a strong sense of Korean identity and they
wanted to retain it. They wanted to pass it down
to their children. They kept the Korean traditions
they knew, cooked the Korean food the way their
parents made it for them, used the language of
their mother country. You know, this is just
how weekends were, right? Like everybody in that
community was more or less along these lines.
And on top of that, we also did have a lot of
students that were there in that area just to
get an education, right? So they weren't even
there. They weren't immigrating to the United
States. They were just there on like a student
visa or something like that, just getting an
education. And so the church became kind of like
a community for them to stay connected, to get
in contact with people who know how to speak
the language and then navigate through the U
.S., whatever political, economic, whatever system
is there. My parents and everyone else in the
circle kind of reinforced the idea that I, being
the blood of two Korean parents, was a Korean
myself. Hence, I needed to learn the language
and the traditions. I needed to do all the things
that came with being a Korean, retaining the
values, demonstrating respect to elders and following
all these unspoken norms in Korean society. I
had to be Korean on the weekends, right? Now,
I want to be clear. I was never in denial that
being Korean is to some degree a part of who
I am, right? And that the Korean culture does
shape me in many ways, right? It shaped my childhood
experience for sure, whether I wanted it to or
not, right? So even though I was born in the
United States and was not really surrounded by
Koreans, except, like I said, mostly on the weekends.
And I ended up, I mean, I had to learn the language.
My parents couldn't speak English. I mean, even
to this day, they can't speak English beyond
maybe like a first grade level. Like it's, I
have to translate everything for them still.
I, you know, I learned the language. I had to,
so that I could communicate with my parents.
I understood some of the culture, at least the
ones that my parents exposed me to. But as I
grew older, I realized like, man, they... They
did not teach me everything. There was actually
a lot more that I just never, ever was exposed
to. But since my parents were especially insistent,
you know, my family celebrated all the bigger
holidays, like the, you know, Korean traditions
on New Year's, of wearing the traditional gown,
the hanbok, and eating rice cake soup, you know,
bowing to your parents and getting... That's
what I saw it as, another chance to get some
money before the holidays were over. And just
generally, a lot of it centered around food,
around meals, learning about Korean food, how
to make it. The kind of palate that I've developed,
a lot of it came from, especially my dad. He
was from the countryside, and he was used to
cooking food from the land. He grew up on a farm.
So, you know, a lot of that definitely did influence
me. But the truth was, I also never felt like
a Korean. Or at least it wasn't, maybe a better
way to put it is, it wasn't like an identity
that I really embraced. It was something that
was kind of imposed on me, right? Because of
the way I look, because of who my parents were,
because that's just kind of how society... Like
our society puts labels on you, right? They categorize
you. They want to understand you. And then so
they'll put you into, they'll give you these
labels and then it just sticks, right? But with
the exception of family and those weekends, everything
else I experienced was nothing like the world
my parents described. The rest of the world seemed
to be following a value system that was very
different than the one that my parents tried
to teach me. No one else outside of this weekend
community viewed the world the same way that
honestly I was living it. And that was the discrepancy,
right? There was a difference between what I
was being told, this is the way the world is,
and this is how you should be as a way of navigating
the world. What I was told on the weekend versus
what I was actually living out the rest of the
time. I was at school and just hanging out with
neighborhood kids and such. And being exposed
to so many people, I mean, maybe this is just
part of living in California and the region that
I lived in, but just being exposed to so many
different people with different cultural norms
and beliefs. Like I said, like when I moved to
Colton, like that area was predominantly Latino.
The park across the street, it was just, just
basically on the weekends, it was just like.
I don't know if Mexico is like this, but it was
just all Mexican neighbors, like, just hanging
out there barbecuing and turning on their mariachi
music and, you know, just spending time with
their family, right? Like, that's what I saw.
That's what I kind of, like, just was exposed
to. And it was just in such, maybe it's just
this exposure to all these different, like, ways
of living out life, having conversations with
people that were different from me that just...
gave me this sense that culture was at least
like what I got to practice and endorse or like
what I wanted to adopt. That there was something
about culture that just felt, how do I say this,
made up. I don't want to say like completely
meaningless. I'm not trying to say that. It's
just something about it that felt like it. I
saw that it held meaning for people. It just
maybe mattered to them more than it does for
me. For me, it just never held much significance.
I think part of it was that it did feel like
a lot of these cultural practices were just different
things that different groups of people placed
meaning in, and they expressed it in different
ways. But there was nothing at the heart of it
about different cultures that made... One somehow
better or more right or good or... And on top
of that, like, if I'm living out a life where
these cultures, I'm just exposed to different
ones, it doesn't ever feel like one is necessarily
mine, right? If that makes any sense, right?
Like, even the Korean practices, it never really
felt like mine because it wasn't. in some ways,
right? It was something that was handed to me
or actually more like forced upon me on the weekends,
but it was just nothing like how I would have
wanted to find meaning or the way that I might
have wanted some of these practices. Moreover,
maybe it's just also some other aspect of me.
I never really got to the heart of it. I just
never liked anyone imposing anything on me, like
a belief or a worldview. So you can imagine just
how much I would have resisted and maybe even
come to hate when somebody tries to impose an
identity on me, and especially a Korean identity,
which I wasn't even in Korea, right? I wasn't
exposed to it on a daily basis, right? I heard
from Koreans repeatedly that it was important
for me to remember my roots and know my heritage.
Uh, they insisted on it. I just hated it so much
that I distinctly remember yelling at my parents
at some point that I'm not Korean. Not because
like, I didn't think I was like technically a
Korean, but rather it was that the culture that
they kind of insisted that I adopt. Right. Um,
I just didn't want that imposition on me. Right.
I wanted to kind of find my own way. And this
was as early as I think in junior high, um, maybe
a little bit before then. Right. Of course, you
know, then they shipped me off immediately to
Korea for an entire summer to spend some time
with my relatives. I think my parents were kind
of taken so far back. They just like didn't know
what to do. And they went to the extreme route
of just shipping me off there. And I was just
passed off from one relative to another for like,
I think, two months while I was out there. I
spent a significant amount of time with my grandparents
who have at that point already like aged quite
a bit. And they were just living out there. uh,
retirement years, essentially on the farm. Uh,
man, so many memories of that, that, that farm,
uh, man, like it was such a different world than
the world I grew up in. I, like I said, like,
I think my dad kind of, I, I, I don't understand
my dad a lot because this is where he grew up.
Right. It was the same place, the same farm,
uh, that he grew up in. It was a rural town with
very little modern amenities. I mean, the house
didn't even have, um, plumbing, it had a toilet
and I guess it was the fancier house, one of
the fancier houses there because the toilet was
in the house and not in like an outhouse. Uh,
but the toilet was in the house, but there wasn't
any plumbing. It's just, it was like a porta
potty, right? You, there's just a dig hole, a
hole, I'm sorry, a deep hole that was dug like
straight down into the ground. Uh, my dad had
these stories of how they would have to periodically
clear out that, uh, that, um, that giant vessel
that was underneath the hole of the poo, and
they would use it as fertilizer, or they would
do something with it, I forget. But the stench
was unbearable. Like, it smelled like a port
-a -potty. Like, it's exactly what you would
think it would smell like if you just had poo
sitting there and other people's poo and pee
just, like, stacked on top of each other, settling
in, and just the stench just... Oh, my gosh.
I felt like I couldn't get it off of me. I did
come back to the U .S. speaking Korean much better.
And I did listen to some Korean music out there,
which began my love -hate relationship with K
-pop, right? The problem was that when I just
lived my life, none of the being Korean part
of it really mattered to me at all. I was more
focused on the fact that I was broke as fuck,
right? That my neighbors were broke as fuck,
that life sucked. Who cares what ethnicity you
are, right? If your life is shit, then it's shit,
right? It doesn't matter. That's what I connected
with. That's where my concern was. I was not
motivated to buy into the importance of this
Korean -ness as part of my identity. It just
didn't carry all that much meaning for me. But
I also think there was something else that was
going on for me. I don't know if other people
kind of viewed it this way, but I felt a kind
of darkness also surrounding this imposition
of holding on to my currentness. Now, I don't
think for most people it was anything dark. I
think for most people it was kind of like, you
know, they're trying to hold on to something
that had a lot of value for them, right? Had
a lot of meaning. It was a part of their identity
and, you know, it meant a lot to them. But I
think in the midst of kind of holding it onto
us so tightly, there was a sense of kind of pride
and nationalism that I was just never comfortable
with. And it wasn't specific to Korean people.
It was just anybody who sensed any kind of pride.
I don't know if maybe this was something to talk
about when I'm talking about like my issues with
my dad, right? But I just never liked pride.
Like there's something about pride that disgusted
me that I was just not attracted to at all. It
was that there's like a stench that it carried
this self -satisfaction and leaning on arrogance
or a false sense of superiority. I just don't
know what it was exactly. I never was able to
kind of. put a good word on it outside of pride,
but there's something about others demanding
that I join in to this fold that just made it
that much worse. That made me, I think, resist
adopting something about my ethnicity as an important
part of my identity. It was honestly the same
kind of feel that I got from the self -proclaimed
Christians at my dad's church that were... always
telling other people that they knew the truth
and that others were wrong, right? It was also
the same that I honestly feel that I got from
myself when I reflect on it, from myself when
I was a proud UCLA Bruin, right? The school pride,
it bordered on irrational. No, it was definitely
irrational. And because of that, like when I,
you know, now that I have a clear head and I
go back, oh man, like. It was pretty excessive,
right? Like I went to a different level with
it. And there's something about that, that it
was the same thing for me anyways, right? It's
also the same feel that I get from narcissists
who are covering up their insecurities. Any of
the pro -America rhetoric, like America is the
greatest country on earth sort of rhetoric. Like,
I mean, it takes all kinds of forms. There's
different flavors, but at the core of it, it's
the same thing. It's a kind of pride, right?
And you might argue that there's like a good
sort of pride, like maybe not beating down on
yourself and having some sense of self -worth,
but I would not call that pride. Like I'm thinking
like people who just thought like they were the
shit, right? And I don't know what it was about
the Korean immigrants in my community, but a
lot of them seem to have that feel. Like I said,
I don't know. Like I wish I could have a longer
conversation with them now. to find out exactly
what was going through their head, I imagine
a lot of it had to do with just a desire in a
world that was completely different for them,
right? Living in an area that was just foreign
to them, essentially, right? Especially people
who came when they were full -grown adults, right?
It's a world that was completely different. Finding,
you know, comfort in something that you knew,
lived in, grew up in, right? I imagine that helped,
but I did find that, The kind of imposing it
on me reeked of like a desire for me to have
the same sense of pride. It like completely missed
who I was because I was not, did not have the
same background as them. There's a gap between
the immigrants that actually came when they were
like 20, 30 years old versus me who was born
in the United States and grew up here. But, you
know, most mostly I just didn't care. I get that
the world operates in a way that it does. And,
you know, they like, you know, in America, you
can't you can't deny that skin color seem to
have had a long, you know. deep impact on the
way that society is structured. So I understand
that society operates a certain way, right? This
is why I would dress up for an interview, right?
The world operates the way that it does, and
people make judgment about you and categorize
you and label you, and it's a way for them to
try to make sense of who you are. But deep down
inside, I just didn't care about any of those
things, right? I just didn't care. And because
I didn't care, I found myself annoyed and not
really seen and understood when people tried
to impose these categories on me, especially
when these categories are made to be some kind
of identifying marker of who I am. It happened
again to some degree. I understand it could work
to my advantage. I will play things up if it
might help. The truth is, like, I think what
happened more often than not was that the way
that I look on the outside or because I speak
a particular language or because I could understand
the collectivist Korean culture, the mindset,
some of the, you know, being aware of the nonverbal
cues, because I can navigate that community better
than just a complete stranger. I think it gave
people the sense that somehow, like, they and
I were. on the same page about stuff, right?
Like we were seeing eye to eye. But the truth
was, like, I could understand but not necessarily
agree as it being something that I would endorse,
right? And I think this became a bigger issue
when, you know, I developed fairly early on a
critical eye towards the Korean culture, morally.
Right. From the way that they treated women,
just had differences in views to some of the
harmful educational practice. I mean, there's
just a range of stuff. Right. I've mentioned
like my issues with K -pop music. Right. I have
like a love hate relationship because there's
many aspects of it that I just absolutely hate.
I think it's absolutely immoral. Right. And it
and it's regardless of a deeper culture. I could
understand the culture. Right. And the practices
and where it comes from. But I was still critical
of it. Because in my eyes, right is right, good
is good, wrong is wrong, right? Like this transcends
culture, right? It doesn't matter. And, you know,
I don't, I don't, I think it was hard in part
because depending on what community I was in,
they were trying to push me in a direction that
wasn't consistent with who I was. deep inside.
When I was around Koreans, they would assume
they would want me to root for, let's say, Koreans
during the World Cup. I have no desire to root
for Koreans in the World Cup. They want me to
understand and practice and live out a lot of
the Korean values. I disagree with quite a few
of them. I don't agree with all of any of the
cultural values of any culture, right? If anything,
like, I felt a deep kinship, right? I felt drawn
to a lot of the Latino, right, values growing
up. I think I saw elements of, you know, black
culture that I really liked. That I was like,
this is a good way to kind of live and understand
and find meaning in life. There were elements
of white culture. I mean, I studied, I mean,
I studied philosophy and my specialization was
in a bunch of Scottish philosophers from 17th
and 18th century, right? So, you know, like I
saw value wherever I saw value, right? There
was never anything that was drawn along ethnicity,
at least for me. Now, I imagine this is different
for other people and that's fine. But what I
didn't like was when, you know, I just had this
sense that people were trying to box me in. And
I think this became much clearer to me when something
happened. I mean, growing up in Los Angeles at
this time, you couldn't escape it, right? It
became very clear in the killing of LaTosha Harlins,
the LAPD's assault of Rodney King, and the LA
civil unrest that followed, right? I had a hard
time standing with Koreans. I always wanted to
stand for truth, justice, wherever I found it,
right? That's why I was critical of pretty much
every culture. Like, I loved aspects of different
cultures, and then I just really hated other
aspects of different cultures, right? Some of
it was just like to each their own, but others,
it was deeply like... offensive to me, the moral
values reflected in it. But I think especially
when all this went down with the LA civil unrest,
right, the Korean community, at least in my neighborhood,
right, with my parents, that community, right,
there was a way in which they were taking a stand
that I just did not agree with. You know? I mean,
let me take this picture for you, right? In the
case of LaTosha Harlan, right, it was a Korean
store owner. who shot Latasha in the back, in
the fucking back, right? That's not self -defense.
I'm not going to stand by that. I don't care
who the fuck you are, right? You should have
been punished accordingly, not let off so easily.
Yet many in the Korean community, at least, like
I said, in my neighborhood, right? The ones that
I was exposed to, right? If they did not outright
support the store owner, They stood silent. They
were silent in all this. And the L .A. civil
unrest impacted a lot of Korean store owners,
right? A lot of this was happening in Koreatown,
right? Some with direct and indirect ties to
my parents and the different church members there,
right? And they obviously would side with the
Koreans, appalled by the violence, like, why
is this happening, right? I was silent on the
issue in front of them because I honestly sided
with the uprising. I understood. The anger and
the frustration, right? I have lived the way
that Korean people were treating and viewing
black people, Mexicans, like in the neighborhood,
right? They would talk about them, like talk
down on them, right? And maybe that's where I
sensed a lot of this pride and arrogance, right?
It's like they had this sense that they were
smarter, they were better, like morally, that
blacks and Latinos were nothing but criminals.
Like, that was the attitude of the Korean community.
And the civil unrest, they just took it as more
of the same. This is just something that Black
people do. This is just something that Latinos
do. That was when I was living in the Inland
Empire, San Bardino. When I spent time in Orange
County later on in life, and this is where I'm
at now, living in this area, right? I... was
and am still disgusted even more by the Korean
community. More specifically, it's the ones that
were able to accrue wealth. And so now they have
a home, a 401k, they have money, capital to spend.
And I was just appalled at how often they tend
to perpetuate the oppression of the poor, including
poor Koreans, right? Other racial groups. Those
without a higher education, right? All while
proudly displaying the accomplishments of Koreans.
It honestly makes me want to throw up. The wealthy
Koreans in this neighborhood, they were the oppressors.
In my eyes, they are adopting the same mindset
as the attitudes of wealthy white oppressors
before them, right? Like, there's no difference
in my eyes between the two. They might speak
as if they side with... The immigrant community,
the poor, whatever else, right? They might play
nice. The image they might project or they want
to project might be something different. But
their silence, their stance on policy, their
attitudes towards social programs, like, tell
me just all I need to know. They were ignorant
and numb to the suffering of those in their own
community. And they would justify it in whatever
way they can. not as an indictment of their own
hoarding of resources or pushing for policies
that benefit them while hurting others. They
engage in the same sort of dog whistle shit.
My parents buy into a lot of this stuff. Even
to this day, they send me text messages of shit
where it's like, where are you getting this?
And it's from other fellow Koreans in their community.
Do I hate them? No, it's not anything like that.
But what I'm pointing out is this. It's going
to be inaccurate more than anything to look at
me and then try to box me in or to try to make
assumptions about my ethnicity, to think that
my ethnicity somehow is informative of anything
about me. Because that is actually not at the
core. of what I care about. And it's reflected
in the way that I live out my life. It's reflected
in the things that I value. It's reflected in
the kinds of things that I'm willing to critique.
It's in the way that I, in the things that I
stand by and the things I stand against. What
I'm saying is this, fuck your ethnicity. I don't
give a shit if we share the same heritage, if
we share the same roots. Or even if we share
the same experience. If anything, it's a reason
for me to come down harder on you. But maybe
that's just me. I personally think that we should
be holding our own communities accountable so
that people from the outside don't have to. So
if you want me to be a part of your community,
you just need to know, I will be a participant
in the community. But part of that means that
I will be critical of it. Because I'd rather,
as a member of the community, be critical of
it. then let an outsider come in and then start
critiquing it. The point is this. My identity
is rooted in a search for truth and justice.
I think that's universal. And my ethnicity, your
ethnicity, doesn't have shit to do with that.
If anything, a pride in your ethnicity, if not
checked, can be the source of your moral degradation.
So stop calling me Korean. It means nothing to
me.