I interviewed Edward Kim on March 16, 2019.
Overview: This interview was taken place at home in Waynesboro, Virginia; since I live close I decided to go home and do the interview. The technology that was used was a voice recorder app called ‘Easy Voice Recorder’ and I did not edit any part of this interview. I recorded this interview in my bedroom because that was the most quietest place to hold an interview, which leads to the obstacle of the interview. My mom and brother started to practice their instruments right when we were going to interview and the rooms in our house are not soundproof so the sounds of the violin, saxophone, piano and cello were pretty distinct. We decided to wait a little longer before we started.
Biography: Edward Kim was born in Seoul, South Korea, on May 27th, 1968. He came from a large family of eight children (six girls and two boys), and he is the eighth child (the youngest). He came to United States when he was fifteen years old, so he has lived in America longer than how much time he has lived in Korea. He graduated from a private high school in Iowa, served in United States Navy, and graduated State University of New York with a degree on electrical engineering. When he was 28 years old, he became an American citizen. Every now and then, he would visit Korea to see his father (my grandfather), who is currently 90 years old.
Research:
1) Once you’ve become a permanent U.S. resident – green card holder – traveling abroad and returning to the U.S. becomes easy (Bray). Holding a green card after immigrating to America allows you to enter and exit the U.S. without any conflict. The green card can help establish U.S. residency and can help work towards on becoming an American citizen. In my father’s case, that is how he was able to go from America to Korea without it being an issue and able to go through the process of becoming an American citizen in order to bring my mother to America safely. Currently my mother is on green card.
Bray, Ilona. “Traveling Outside of the U.S. as a Green Card Holder.” Www.alllaw.com,
Nolo, 6 Aug. 2015, www.alllaw.com/articles/nolo/us-immigration/traveling-outside-us-green-card.html.
2) The Korean War of 1950-1953 prompted a major wave of immigration from South Korea, and the liberalization of American immigration laws during the 1960’s brought an even larger wave of immigrants. My father went to America in the 80’s so immigration was possible for him. By the turn of the twenty first century, Koreans were one of the fastest growing ethnic groups in the United States (Immigration of the United States).
“Korean Immigrants.” Immigration to the United States,
http://immigrationtounitedstates.org/673-korean-immigrants.html
3) I did some research about gender roles and my search results mainly had articles about women’s role in Korea. Korean women, from my knowledge, are mainly in charge of being in the house, nursing, and cooking. Men have more rights or power over women. According to this article called “Women’s Role in Contemporary Korea,” it mentioned, “Women, in general, could not participate in society as men did, and their role was limited to household matters,” (Center of Global Education). Around the late 90’s Presidential Commission on Women’s Affairs was established to handle issues specifically involving women. The commission was elevated and expanded to become the Ministry of Gender Equality. Gender equality happened later than America. Although there is an equality in gender roles now, in Korea, but I believe some families still go by the gender roles because of how much they value their regular tradition/culture.
“Women’s Role in Contemporary Korea.” Asia Society,
https://asiasociety.org/education/womens-role-contemporary-korea
Transcription of the interview:
Eunice: Hello, this is Eunice Kim interviewing my father, Edward Kim, about his transition from Seoul, South Korea to the United States. In your bio, you said that you went to a private school in Iowa, how was it like going to private school?
Edward: The private school I went, is located central Iowa, where not many Asian population there to begin with. This probably the main reason my parents send me to this school to learn English fast and know the cultures of America in correct ways. The Iowa, at the time of my first attending the school, it’s very small in all aspect of everything about the city. At the same time, they never seen an Asian or Korean like me before.
Eunice: So how did you end up in Virginia?
Edward : Well, most of our moves were my work relation. When I was graduated, my university in New York, I got a position at small packaging equipment company as an engineer. After 7 years in that company, the company was laying off 1/2 of work forces in the plant. So, I found better opportunity in Richmond, VA, similar to the job I had in Syracuse, New York area. After the short two years of working there, I move to another company in Richmond, then another two years later, we all moved to western part of Virginia, which we are in right now in Waynesboro.
Eunice: How was your cultural transition from Korea to America? Was it easy or difficult?
Edward: Sort answer, pretty easy. Because when I first come to United States, it was a quite different than where I used to live. The Seoul was very big city and lot of population. The city was very busy and always a fast pace. But Iowa was very slow and small. The public transportation was none exist in Iowa, but in Korea, I use public transportation to go to school every day. Also, aspect of seniority was quite different than Korea was. In Korea, older person gets the decision power always and kids and women have very little to say. But, I felt there are significant differences the moment I began to speak English more fluently.
Eunice: Why did you come to America at a young age?
Edward: There were stiff education leaps or differences in Korea. Meaning, too many students but very small opportunities available in Seoul Korea. My parents believed in American education better than Korean one. Not many people get opportunity like this to get better education like I received. When the opportunity came thru, I had to take it and believed in it.
Eunice: What made you decide to become an American citizen?
Edward: Uh, I met your mom in Korea. We were dating very short time but decided to get married and live together in United States. In order for me to invite her properly and in timely manner, the best possible way to be an United States of American citizen. So I began to process as a citizen and as soon as I received the citizen, I was able to invite your mom from Korea to US.
Eunice: So the conscription of South Korea requires male citizens between the ages of 18 and 28 to perform in the army compulsory military service.
Edward: Uh huh.
Eunice: Did you still have to do the mandatory military service for Korea?
Edward: Short answer, no. Uh, I left Korea when I was 16 years old and came to America and became green card holder, legal alien. The Korea doesn’t allow having dual citizenships so I gave up on having Korean citizenship. Until I became US citizen, I had to report back to Korea, that I wasn’t interested to go back and serve the country, almost every year until I reached the age of 26.
Eunice: Can you tell me how it was like to have seven older siblings?
Edward: Oh boy! I don’t think my family is very different than others. We have fights, arguments, meltdowns and pretty stressful times. We have good times along with the countless bad times. We can lean on each other and look to each other for company, for a friend, advice, encouragement, and for the truth. One major difference between blended and large families against the traditional families is division. But we didn’t have none of that (He meant that his family didn’t have any of that). When I was at young age, loves sharing between siblings were difficult at times. But as we got older, we looked out each other and became a big and whole company like family.
Eunice: Since you have sisters, did you guys have different rules and expectations growing up, such as gender roles?
Edward: Uh yes. The Korea, when I was in middle school age or before that, have significant different roles of men and women. At the place where men and women socialize in one house, the women usually assemble in the kitchen while they cut fruits or make meals. Men usually settle in the living room and make small talks with other men. This culture faded away when the world realized about women’s rights and their contribution in society.
Eunice: Okay, last question, if you remember, how was South Korea’s condition like when you still lived there?
Edward: Well, when I left Korea, was about 30 years after the Korean War. So Korea was still in building more and more buildings and growing, grows in many aspects of capitalism country. With the dad alone earning for the family, it was enough to feed at children and send several kids to USA for better opportunity and better educations.
Eunice: Okay, thank you for letting me interview you!
Conclusion: Overall, the interview went smoothly. I am a little disappointed that my interview was really short and I stuttered a lot when I was asking these questions to my dad. My dad’s English is a little broken so I was not really sure if you or everyone in class would understand what my dad is trying to say. Lastly, I realized that my little clock at the wall of my bedroom was ticking kind of loud, so if you hear a ticking noise in the background, it is my clock.