Q: Please tell us a little about yourself!

I was born in Toronto, and left home for college at 16. We were known in my neighborhood, family, and wider Korean community as the “ice cream” family for decades because of the Baskin Robbins store my parents ran as franchisees.

My first public speaking prize came at age nine in 4th grade. I credit my dad with cultivating that love of storytelling and encouraging me to think about turning my talent into a career. He was not only a good storyteller himself, he was a great cheerleader when I competed in speaking competitions.  My mom often substituted for the audience or a judge to help me practice at home for those contests.

Although they preferred I become professionally licensed somehow – in medicine or law, I think they were convinced by my teachers that I had a knack for public presentation. My parents encouraged my interest in creative and language arts, though they voiced some skepticism on how a career should be made of those interests. When I announced in high school I wanted to be a television reporter, it took them some time for them to come around. But my dad was the one who pointed out a female presenter on TV one day and suggested that my speaking contests were some sign that I could make a living out of what I love to do.

I was informed a lot as a child by my parents' day-to-day routine of more than 30 years running a 7-day-a-week ice cream store in a country where winter sometimes lasted 6 months. I’d help out at that store, in Toronto’s West End, on weekends and during every summer. This wasn't soft serve! From scooping ice cream for cones, to hand-packing gallons of ice cream, decorating ice cream cakes on a 5-minute timer, and stocking the shelves, it was back-breaking, bicep-building work. In between, seeing my parents gamely trying to be the neighborhood “good times” family – taking orders for desserts needed for graduations, birthdays, anniversaries and confirmation parties – was instructive and inspiring. We seldom made it to such celebrations ourselves, because our business was driven by weekend and holiday orders, and customers who needed us to help make their celebrations possible. Mom and Dad would go hours without sitting down or eating, the fatigue and hunger chasing them each day, as they actively learned from and mirrored their customers needs and desires. They remained unfailingly kind, sunny and patient. Even with gaggles of demanding parents and kids on some hot summer days, all screaming to have a taste-test of multiple flavors before deciding, they never lost their cool.  In many ways, that experience helped me to be imaginative, flexible and questioning as a reporter.  

Somehow, my parents made those work shifts enjoyable. They were awesome singers, often singing 60s and 70s hits in harmony, or making up lyrics to well known tunes in a way that cracked me up. It always amazed me that the overall stress of raising kids as immigrants and running a daily business did not take joy away from my parents.

The fact they sent both me and my brother to college on such a modest income from that business also impressed me quite a bit.

I think that’s why dancing, singing, and reading a good book is still so enjoyable for me because they are all activities my parents found time to do with us when we weren't working. Dad loved to clip articles for me to read out of the local paper, knowing I was interested in reporting; mom always took me to the local library to get a new stack of books every few weeks. And going through the LP’s they collected in post-war Korea and in Toronto, after moving there together, was a highlight of our evenings.

Q: How did you get involved with KAFSC?

Just a few months after arriving in New York for a work contract in 2002, I was asked to emcee the Asian Women in Business fundraising gala. There, Aiyoung Choi approached me and asked, “Can we be friends?” and I was pulled into the orbit of energy that is KAFSC, volunteering first as an emcee and then producing videos of the cultural programming, social services and counseling work done by the staff and volunteers. I’I've had an ongoing relationship with KAFSC since.  

Q: What’s your favorite thing about KAFSC and what we do? 

My favorite thing is KAFSC’s original vision, to give voice to some unspeakably horrible realities in the Korean American community. Thirty years ago, it started with a single phone in the basement of a church, a hotline for people to call when they had no hope of surmounting violence or abuse at home. That took foresight and compassion and courage.

Q: Tell us about social issues, projects, and/or organizations that matter to you and why.

Harmony in a diverse society is often made possible by what members of that society agree to believe in together and debate together. Popular culture is an implicit representation of that agreement, which manifests in various ways of storytelling. So helping others to have a voice in the overall narrative of the culture is important to me, whether it’s getting a point of view into a news report or supporting others’ creative efforts to tell their stories their way. So joining Korean American Story’s board of directors a few years ago was a natural fit. Understanding diversity within the Korean American community only strengthens the community, just as storytelling in the news helps strengthen all of our roles in answering the daily question, “What do I care about?” The more voices there are in answering that question, the more fully we all understand ourselves.

Another area that’s always interested me is the status of women, and this has sharpened since becoming a mother with two girls. We just marked the anniversary of the equal rights amendment, and did you know there are still more than a dozen states that have not ratified it, leaving it just shy of becoming constitutionally enshrined? Or that women are more likely than men to have taken on multiple jobs to make ends meet post-2008 – but still fight for wage and salary parity at the highest levels of work in the public and private sector? Or that every human being starts off in the womb as a female template?

Q: Do you have any goals/projects this year?

One goal I keep putting off - self-defense classes. A friend recently inspired me when she mentioned taking shadow boxing, and how if she needed to, she knows how to punch effectively in a way that doesn't’t hurt herself.

Another project is researching my family history. I come from a line of Lees directly connected to Admiral Yi Soon Shin, a political and literary hero of Korean lore. It’s been an intriguing part of my identity I’ve never found time to explore. Nailing down enough knowledge for myself, in some form – maybe a short story just for my family? – is a personal goal, and also a challenge, just to see if I can carry a narrative on a subject past the 2 minute news reports I normally do!   

Q: What is something that most people might not know about you?

I logged 15 hours of flying trapeze time when I took some lessons at TSNY more than a decade go. Great way to scare yourself silly, especially if heights make you yack.

These days I try to blow off steam with swimming and yoga. Lately, dancing with my little girls to music I grew up with has been very satisfying. We do it almost every night. 

I also love working with my hands on things that require oodles of patience - because I’m not a patient person! My past efforts include spurts of cooking and baking night after night (followed by weeks of getting takeout). One year, I knit half a dozen scarves and baby blankets for friends, and even untangled miles of knotted yarn for a couple of months because I found it therapeutic. 

Another year I took several silk embroidery classes with some friends, and really loved the satisfaction of producing brilliantly colored pieces. 

And I really enjoy playing pool – I’m not great, but I’m not bad, and for years, while I’ve owned my own cue, I’ve never been brave enough to carry it with me! Something to shoot for, I guess.