Min Jin Lee

There's that optimistic part of you.

Yeah.

You moved from a nice middle class home in Korea where your mother was a piano teacher.

Your dad was a white collar executive.

Yeah.

to what you refer to as an ugly one bedroom rental with dirty orange shag carpeting in a squat red building with mice and roaches on Van Cleek Street in Elmhurst, Queens.

You've written that even as a little girl, you knew there was something wrong.

What felt most wrong about it?

I think I wasn't used to the dirt and the ugliness and the danger.

So all of that really surprised me because it wasn't like we were well off in Korea, but we weren't poor.

And I remember thinking I had everything I needed.

And also for a child to always have a parent around, it's such a secure thing.

And also as a child, I didn't ever think about money because I had everything that I needed.

Whereas when I came to America, I realized like, oh, I think our situation has really changed in the world.

And I couldn't quite understand why.

Because my parents had the same clothing, but we had lost everything in terms of our household goods because some of it was brought with us, but most of it we didn't bring.

We had to get new things.

I remember being afraid.

I do remember feeling afraid.

What motivated your family to come to the United States in the first place?