Most parents in Korea normally do not allow their children to watch television, but my parents were different. They let me do that as long as I watched educational or instructive programs like documentaries or the news. I think it was permitted because my father had worked for MBC, a major broadcasting company in Korea for over thirty years.

The only way I could see my father’s face when I was young was by watching “MBC Newsdesk” every night at nine. My mother called me,

“June-Young, your father is on TV now. Come out.”

Then, I woke up, jumped out of my bed, and ran into a living room. Sitting in front of the TV, I watched the news while I kept saying, “It’s Dad.” In fact, I did not watch the news but just looked at my father.

My father, who was a news anchorman of “Newsdesk,” a main news program of MBC in Busan, came back home around 11 every night. He usually went to work before I got up in the morning, so I was barely able to see him during the time.

Sometimes my mother awoke me when my father was about to leave home for work, and I ran over to my father and held him tightly, saying, “Bye” and kissing him on his cheeks. I still remember the feeling when I touched my cheek to his cheek. It was smooth and warm. Twenty years later, while embracing him in the airport before I came to the U.S. to study abroad, his hug was still warm.