Brandon Park
Please tell me a little bit about yourself.
“I’m a freshman from Northern Virginia and I’ve lived in Virginia my entire life. My parents struggled a lot as immigrants, especially since I was the only Asian in my entire grade and I would’ve been the only Asian in my entire school if it weren’t for my brother. In that area, there weren’t a lot of Asians my age. There were a lot of elderly Asian people. So my parents didn’t really find a lot of friends to talk to. They struggled a lot. My dad was the one going out and interacting with people in English and my mom didn’t develop those skills as quickly.
There was one time our toilet broke and a plumber had to come over. In Asian households, you don’t wear shoes and my mom knew that the plumber probably would not get that, so she tried to sound out to him and piece together a sentence and she said: ‘Can you step on the newspaper?’ or ‘Do you mind wearing these shoes because I can just vacuum later?’ But the plumber took this as an insult and ended up yelling at my mom, and he ended up leaving without fixing the toilet. So my mom started crying and called my dad. I didn’t know what was happening since I couldn’t speak English.
We finally brought our first house in 2013, so it’s been 15 years of renting and living in apartments. It was a huge accomplishment for them. I knew my parents worked hard. After we moved to Northern Virginia, my mom took on a job, because my brother and I could take care of ourselves at that point. I realized how much they worked. They’re in their 40s now, but I looked at them once and I started crying because I remember after they told me that story, I started working and studying more. I joined clubs and I did everything I could so that I could become successful one day and pay them back, so that they would never have to work again.”
