My family and I

A lot of things have contributed to my ‘story’ of who I am such as soccer, schooling, and my family. I think the thing that has had the most significant impact on me are my parents.

To give you a little background of my parents I’ll start with my mom. She grew up in Cambodia in the time when the Khmer Rouge ruled. If you aren’t familiar with the Khmer Rouge, it was a party literally translated as Red Cambodians which was the name given to the followers of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, who were the ruling party in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. They are remembered primarily for its policy of social engineering, which resulted in genocide. Its attempts at agricultural reform led to widespread famine, while its insistence on absolute self-sufficiency, even in the supply of medicine, led to the deaths of thousands from treatable diseases. Arbitrary executions and torture carried out by its cadres against perceived subversive elements, or during purges of its own ranks between 1976 and 1978, are considered to have constituted a genocide. (I pulled this all from Wiki but if I were to tell you stories of my mother’s firsthand experience it would run on for hours). In a nutshell, if you didn’t follow the party, you were tortured, brainwashed, and/or killed.) I remember in grade school we were given an assignment to learn about one of our parent’s backgrounds and I am so grateful I was able to learn about my mom’s tragic and horrific past. She told me stories of how they used to be rich but after the Khmer Rouge ruled, their money was worthless and how she was taken away from her parents and forced to work at camps. She also told me the frightening story of how they had to cross fields full of mines and dead bodies to get to the refugee camps.

My father was born and raised in Taiwan in a small village and grew up very poor. He was sent to boarding school because his family could not afford to raise him. The boarding school was funded by the government which is why his family was able to send him there. He told me stories of how he grew up with over 50 students from the age of 5 – 17. He told me they all shared a connection with one another as if they were brother and sister because they grew up together for so many years. He is still are good friends with everyone and held many jobs in order to find his way to America.

I think growing up my parent’s background has shaped and molded me into who I am now. My mom is the most patient and wonderful mother a child could ask for. She never thought twice of buying or giving us new things or food that were expensive. She did always think twice about buying herself new things because of that mindset she grew up in. She didn’t want her children (my siblings and i) to grow up as deprived as she was when she grew up. Now as I am older and able to look back at my childhood, it makes me appreciate all of the things she had done for us. My father taught us to let us make our own mistakes and was very open to allowing us to choose our own paths, because that was how he was raised.

My family also owns a restaurant and working at the restaurant has also been a life changer. One example, I took a personality test/predictive index test for an internship I applied for and it pretty much got me exact exception for one thing, it said I wasn’t a people person. I believe if I didn’t work at the restaurant this would very well be true but working there since I was a child has changed me and made me adapt to succeed in the restaurant. I also believe working at the restaurant has taught me the value of a dollar and how important education is in order to not live such a hard life. My whole family experience has shaped me in a motivated, hardworking individual who wants to succeed in life in order to pay back my parents and make them proud for surviving their tough childhoods and be rewarded for what they truly deserve. I am also very openminded as an individual and act/think similar to my father (so I have been told). I believe all these experiences my parent’s went through have shaped me into my story today.