Project Between

Sharon Choi is a filmmaker who became one of the most beloved faces of Oscar season when she interpreted for director Bong Joon Ho and the "Parasite" team in 2020. She's also a third-culture kid who, after spending two years in California as a young girl, had to relearn her mother tongue when her family moved back to Korea. She spent the rest of her childhood yearning to leave her native country, dreaming of one day telling her own story through the language of cinema.

It was an absolute pleasure chatting with Sharon about art, movies, American culture, living between worlds, childhood trauma, interpretation and finding the right words for our experiences, and building our ideal homes. 

As I mentioned at the end of the interview, I loved being in the space created by our dialogue. I hope you'll enjoy the conversation as much as I did.

#ProjectBetween #podcast #thirdculturekid #SharonChoi #filmmaker #film #Parasite #BongJoonHo #Oscars #Korean #Americanculture #interpretation #cinema #팟캐스트 #샤론최 #봉준호 #기생충 #TCK #art 

Jean Go is a third-culture kid who grew up moving between Korea, the U.S. and Sweden. Since 2011, she's been based in L.A. working in the game industry as an artist, creating characters and concept art for videos games such as League of Legends. 

In this episode we talked about being the tallest kids in Korean school, art classes and learning about proportions from Western textbooks, struggling to fit in, playing online video games with friends in the metaverse, and finding a place to call home with neighbors who bring over cookies.

We didn't hang out much in high school but we should have; we have so much in common! If you're a TCK who grew up playing video games, this one's for you.

#TCK #thirdculturekid #podcast #projectbetween #internationalschool #Sweden #Korea #LosAngeles #culturalidentity #videogames #LeagueofLegends #conceptartist #Korean-American #한국 #국제학교 #정체성 #미국 #스웨덴 #게임 #리그오브레전드 #롤 

Happy New Year! 

My first guest of 2023 is Henry Hwang, a dear friend from my high school days in Korea. We've known each other now for over 17 years, so long in fact that I forgot that he was a third-culture kid. We became friends before we even knew what being a "TCK" meant, so this episode felt like opening up a box of treasures in the attic.

Henry spent his childhood in New York, Hong Kong and Seoul. Having attended college and grad school in the U.S., he is currently a biomedical engineer based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. 

When I asked him the identity question, Henry said Korea contributes about 60% of his cultural identity, primarily because he thinks about it a lot. "I think about whether I'm living up to my self-imposed ideal of what it means to be a Korean." I wonder this too, in no small measure.

#TCK #thirdculturekid #podcast #projectbetween #internationalschool #SIS #HongKong #Seoul #NewYork #culturalidentity #livinginthehyphen #Korean-American #motherland #한국 #국제학교 #정체성 #미국 #홍콩 #서울국제학교 

Aurélie Knecht is a French third-culture kid who spent her childhood in the Netherlands and Germany, and an enriching four months in Spain. She attended university in London, and now lives and works in Mexico City. 

Though she grew up quite immersed in French culture, raised by French parents and attending French schools abroad, she quickly realized when she met other kids who only grew up in France that she was not like them. 

As an adult, she said different parts of her personality like different cities better. She also regards many places to be her home.

Aurélie was the first person express interest in Project Between via email. If you'd like to share your story or even just say hi, you can send letters to thebetweenproject@gmail.com 

#TCK #thirdculturekid #podcast #projectbetween #France #Germany #Mexico #French #Spanish #German #European #lyceefrancais #enfance #OssauIraty #프랑스 #프랑스문화 #독일 #멕시코 #팟캐스트

Maiya Li was born to a Koryoin (ethnic Korean) dad and a Kazakh mom, and grew up in a small town in rural Kazakhstan with very few Koreans around. Born the year Kazakhstan declared independence from the USSR, Russian was her first language and Kazakh her second. She came to Korea to study in her early twenties looking for some answers to her heritage.  

When I approached her for this interview, she told me "she sometimes feels like she belongs nowhere in particular" since she's considered Korean in Kazakhstan while in Korea she's seen as a foreigner. I immediately knew her story would fit right into the spectrum of third-culture kid narratives here on the show. 

Maiya talked about her multicultural upbringing, her comfort food beshbarmak (бешбармак), living in Korea, and how Russia's war on Ukraine has been troubling post-Soviet countries including Kazakhstan. 

You can find Project Between on Anchor, Spotify, Apple and Google Podcasts.

#TCK #thirdculturekid #podcast #projectbetween #Kazakhstan #Goryeoin #ethnicKorean #halfKorean #postSoviet #CentralAsia #warinUkraine #USSR #팟캐스트 #카자흐스탄 #고려인 #중앙아시아 #beshbarmak

Born in Tucumán, Argentina to Korean parents who met and got married in the Latin American country, Elena Suh spent her entire childhood there until she moved to Seoul to attend university. After living in Korea for over a decade in her twenties, she moved to Shanghai and was happily settled until the pandemic hit, and her short vacation to Argentina turned into a prolonged stay.  

We spoke about being raised by Korean parents in a different culture, and learning to embrace our Korean heritage and pungent foods later in life. Elena also talked about the culture shock that accompanied her move back to Korea, and finding comfort in Asian cities. Having lived in Asia for so long, Argentinian dinner time is now a tad too late, meaning snacking before 10 p.m. dinner parties.

Tune in to hear about two separate lives, lived on opposite ends of the world.

#ProjectBetween #podcast #TCK #thirdculturekid #Tucumán #Argentina #Seoul #Shanghai #Spanish #LatinAmerica #KoreanLanguage #Asia #asianpride #팟캐스트 #프로젝트비트윈 #아르헨티나 #한국문화 #서울 #상하이

Cassie Destremau is a French Palestinian third-culture kid who grew up trekking the world thanks to a dad that worked in oil. Born in Abu Dhabi, she spent her childhood in France, Venezuela, Nigeria, Angola, Texas, Brazil and Dubai, spending one to four years in each country. 

She attended both local and international schools, meaning many languages were learned and sometimes forgotten along the way. Her two comfort foods are machboos, an Arabic rice dish, and cassoulet, a French stew made with duck confit and sausages. Though she holds a French passport she says she feels like a stranger in French society, and so for now she's a TCK on the move. 

Cassie picked sport as "the constant in her life," the "one thread among everything being so unstable in our lives." Dear listeners, what's been a constant in your life?

#TCK #podcast #thirdculturekid #ProjectBetween #CassieDestremau #French #Palestinian #AbuDhabi #France #Venezuela #Nigeria #Angola #Texas #Brazil #Dubai #machboos #cassoulet #comfortfood #commonthread #childhood #팟캐스트 #영어 #어린시절 #프랑스 

Sung Ryu is a literary translator and a diplomat kid who spent her childhood moving between Korea, the U.S. and Canada. She recently moved back to Korea after four years in Singapore.

She's been a supporter of Project Between from the very start and it was an absolute pleasure having her on the show. We talked about attending local schools and finding your people in diaspora kids; K-dramas, K-pop and Korean middle school; tantalizing Singaporean dishes; allergies gained from each new move; and of course, Korean literature and Smoking Tigers!

Here's a list of Sung's recent translations: Shoko’s Smile by Choi Eunyoung, I’m Waiting for You: And Other Stories by Kim Bo-Young co-translated with Sophie Bowman and Tower by Bae Myung-hoon.

Follow Sung on twitter @sungaroo for the latest updates.

#ProejctBetween #TCK #thirdculturekids #podcast #SungRyu #Koreanliterature #Korea #Canada #US #diplomatkid #SmokingTigers #Kdrama #Kpop #diaspora #Singapore #bakchormee #Shoko'sSmile #I'mWaitingforYou #팟캐스트 #쇼코의미소 #최은영 #당신을기다리고있어 #김보영 #한국문학 #문학번역 

Heesun Park is a third-culture kid who spent her childhood moving back and forth between Korea, Singapore and the UAE. 

But I had no idea she was a TCK until a few years into our friendship because she never talked about it and presented as being 100% Korean in the way she spoke and acted. Mind you, this was our very first English conversation to happen in the history of our friendship.

In this episode we sat down to talk about why she kept her TCK side hidden all these years. Surprisingly, her native Korean friends didn't think her Korean was that perfect after all.

Tune in to hear about a childhood spent near the tropics, surrounded by culturally diverse friends and equally diverse food and music. 

#thirdculturekid #TCK #Singapore #UAE #Dubai #secretidentity #Korea #childhood #podcast #ProjectBetween

Modiegi Mogale is proudly South African through and through, but her "best kept secret is that she was born in Sweden and lived there until she was six years old." 

Modi's dad was involved with the freedom fighters, uMkhonto we Sizwe and the African National Congress (ANC), a political party associated with Nelson Mandela that fought for the end of Apartheid and giving full voting rights to Black and mixed-race South Africans.  

Her family was in exile in Sweden until freedom was finally won and Apartheid came to an end in the early 1990s, in a series of steps that led to the formation of a democratic government in 1994.

Modi is now back in Sweden, her journey having brought her back full circle to where it all began. Today Modi is "proudly South African and humbly Swedish."

#TCK #thirdculturekid #SouthAfrica #Sweden #exile #Apartheid #ANC #NelsonMandela #freedomfighters #votingrights #Johannesburg #podcast #childhood #ProjectBetween

Alex Pérez-Castells is a first generation American born to a Spanish mother and Chilean father, raised in Boston and educated in the French system. He considers himself a "fourth-culture kid," being perfectly fluent in English, Spanish and French and its related cultures. This also means that all of these cultures he belongs to "don't really live harmoniously and equally within him, being in a constant battle for his nurture and attention." 

Alex talks about his go-to comfort foods from each of his cultural influences, his favorite city of Barcelona, the story behind his (grand)parents' decision to educate him in the French system and so much more in this episode that spans many countries and generations. 

Alex has a master's degree in shoe design and maroquinerie (leather craft) and currently resides in Barcelona, Spain.

#TCK #thirdculturekid #Spain #Chile #Boston #LyceeFrancais #Barcelona #tortademilhojas #fourthculture

Haseung (Maddie) Joung is a third-culture kid (#TCK) who spent the first half her life in Atlanta, Georgia in the U.S. and the other half mostly in Korea. 

Haseung didn't think she could be a TCK having only lived in just one other country, but her childhood says otherwise - she felt alone in struggling with her identity as a teenager at a local American school, and when she came back to Korea at age 14, she experienced reverse culture shock in the country of her nationality. 

If you grew up in the American South, enjoyed watching K-dramas like "Boys Over Flowers" or went to local schools as opposed to international schools growing up, this one's for you!

#thirdculturekids #Atlanta #Seoul #Kdrama #boysoverflowers #schooluniforms #cultureshock

Meet Ha Yeong Kim and Mingyeong Jun, two childhood friends who grew up in Central America speaking English, Korean and Spanish.

Ha Yeong moved to Guatemala at age 7, as the middle child of a Korean missionary family. After completing high school there, she moved back to Seoul to attend university. She says her style has become "quite Koreanized" since moving back, though the Guatemalan side of her -- big reactions and talking with her hands -- remains very much intact.

Mingyeong was born in Korea and moved to Guatemala at age 5 or 6, and finished high school there before moving to the U.S. for college. She has always considered Guatemala to be her home. She says her passion for people and things is her most Guatemalan trait.

Both friends said their go-to comfort food was tacos!

#TCK #Guatemala #thirdculturekid #Korea #CentralAmerica #AvenidaSeul

Hana gets a taste of her own medicine answering the TCK Questionnaire, a list of questions she developed for her guests on Project Between. 

Hana's sister Harin joins the show from Toronto as the guest host in this episode. 

Ajit Pillai, a research engineer and a lecturer at the University of Exeter in the U.K., is a third-culture kid who has stronger ties to Sweden than any other country associated with his childhood. 

Ajit was born in Sweden to Indian parents, then lived in Japan between the ages of 7-10 in the late 90s during the height of Pokemon. He spent his teenage years attending an international school in New Delhi, India before moving to the U.S. to attend university. 

He speaks English and Swedish but swears exclusively in Swedish, though his dream language depends on what he's been speaking during the day. 

Two TCK Korean women, Jaey and Hana, talk about the places that shaped their views on gender norms, relationships and gender roles. 

Jaey Kang was born in Busan, S. Korea but moved to California when she was 10, and “lived in a different place every single year for the next 15 years.” After graduating from university in the U.S. she moved to Sweden for grad school. She currently works in marketing and is based in Seoul.

TCK women who grew up in countries with more liberal attitudes toward gender roles but now live in a more conservative society can probably relate to the points made in this episode.

Danbi Lee is a new mom currently based in Germany, and a third-culture kid (TCK) who grew up in Turkey, Korea, and South Africa, attending college in the U.S.

In this episode, the guest and host (two old pals) talk about growing up in South Africa as Korean kids in the late 90s and early 00s. Their memories include attending Hangeul Hakkyo on Saturday mornings, racism in the classroom, and struggling to fit in among their peers.

If you're someone who lived abroad, whether as a TCK or as part of the immigrant narrative, you may have had similar experiences growing up! Especially if your family is Korean. 

Eunice Kim (a.k.a. Mothfly) is a media artist and music producer who divides her time between Korea, Japan and the U.S.

She was born in Tokyo and spent most of her childhood in Japan, but says she “doesn’t have an especially strong sense of cultural identity” and “wouldn’t call herself Japanese even though she speaks that language more.” 

She speaks mostly Japanese at home with her parents, but it’s not their native language. Her dad, a third-culture kid who grew up in Brazil since age 12, moved to Japan in his early 20s in search of opportunity. Her mom went to Japan for work, and that’s where the couple met.

Listen to Mothfly's latest track "Pure" at the following link: https://mothfly.lnk.to/pure

#TCK #thirdculturekids #Japan #Korea #Brazil #mothfly

Writer and translator Anton Hur was born in Sweden, and spent his childhood between Korea, Ethiopia, Hong Kong, the U.S. and Thailand. 

Anton identifies as 100% Korean, but his favorite city is Bangkok. His comfort food is Ethiopia's staple flatbread injera. He says attending numerous international schools gave him hope for humanity.

Anton's translation of Bora Chung's "Cursed Bunny" was included on the 2022 International Booker Prize shortlist. He also had the distinction of having two of his translations longlisted for the Booker, the other one being Sang Young Park’s "Love in the Big City."

"When I read a book, I want to be surprised by it. I want a book that is so beyond my imagination, that it blows my mind."

Hi I’m Hana and you’re listening to Project Between, a podcast about third culture kids and their experiences growing up between many cultures.

I’m an in-betweener, and through this podcast I hope to meet with many others like me, people whose roots don’t grow too deep, who wish they had global passports, who wish all their close friends could live in the same city for once.

I look forward to reconnecting with old friends, and meeting many news ones along the way.

In this episode of Project Between, two sisters who spent their childhood and young adult years in Johannesburg, Hong Kong, Seoul, New York, Montreal and Toronto compare notes on what they remember about specific events from the last two decades. 

Obama winning the election, your first cellphone, the rise of Gangnam Style to the early days of COVID-19 -- where were you when it all went down?