After a 14-hour flight from Seoul, South Korea, my father, my mother, and I landed at Chicago O’Hare with our legs throbbing and our bladders full. It was winter break, and I was 15. I knew that Michael Jordan played for the Chicago Bulls. I knew Lake Michigan was created by glaciers. I knew the Willis Tower, which was the tallest building in the world when it was first built. But the facts I knew about Chicago were different from my experience. I remember how cold it was and how nervous I was. It was my first time in America, and I was intimidated by all the unknown English being spoken around me and the unfamiliar faces of Americans.
There was something else that made me even more nervous, however. I was in Chicago to meet my paternal grandfather, my only living grandfather, for the first time. My grandfather once ran a large steel company before his secretary committed embezzlement and left the company in ruins. My grandfather left Korea after his business collapsed and built a life in Chicago, where he has run a laundromat for about twenty years. After we got through customs, we walked out into the busy terminal. My grandfather was right outside the baggage claim. He was a lot shorter and slimmer than I expected. He wore glasses. When he spoke, his voice was deeper than I expected. He wore the clothes of an average man his age, dark and dull. I felt strangely sad and happy at the same time. Mostly, I was curious. It would become the strangest vacation I have ever been on. Chicago became completely tied to my grandfather.
My grandfather and his partner, a woman named Alice ten years younger than he, took my family to a pancake house. It was my first American meal. The pancakes were too sugary and sweet for me and I awkwardly pushed the food around on my plate for ten minutes while listening to my grandfather talk to my father. At one point, my grandfather turned to me and started asking me questions. He asked me how old I was and where I went to school. I wondered how my grandfather could know so little about me. Then, I wondered how I could know so little about my grandfather. My grandfather finally asked me if I knew that my father was fat as a child. I laughed and said, No. My father now is tall and in shape, heading to the pool every morning at 5am before going to work at the clinic. My grandfather started talking about how many ChocoPies my father used to eat, and I laughed because I couldn’t imagine that version of my father. My father laughed, and my mother laughed, too. Obviously, my grandfather was my grandfather.
The next day, my grandfather invited our family to the church he attended. My grandfather’s life revolves around the Albany Park and Avondale neighborhoods. These neighborhoods were once considered Chicago’s unofficial Koreatown. Since the 1990’s, the Korean population has been on the decline. Ironically, my grandfather moved there as Koreans were moving out. He had made his home there, and there were still enough Koreans that there were Korean churches, groceries, and restaurants. Joong Boo Market on Kimball Ave and H Mart on Jackson Blvd. On the day we visited my grandfather’s church, there were a lot of Koreans out there for the Sunday evening service, and our family listened to the pastor’s sermons for two hours. The hymn “Lift High the Cross” rang through the pews with an angelic sound that filled me with piety. I felt warm and fuzzy. After service ended, the churchgoers enjoyed a large supper of bulgogi and kimbap downstairs. Warmhearted women were kindly sharing meals and everyone was cordial to each other. In Seoul, my family attends every Sunday evening service at Korea Myeongdong Cathedral. Strange, I thought, even on the other side of the world, people worshiped the same way, laughed the same way, and ate the same way.
The next day, we visited the popular landmark the John Hancock Center and ate at The Signature Room at the 95th. It was a restaurant high above street level on the 95th floor. My grandfather made the reservation. As we sped up in the elevator, I felt the air pressure build up quickly in my ear. From the table where we were sitting, we had a panoramic view of the splendid city skyline. I ordered the eggs benedict, my grandfather and father both ordered the crabcakes and my mother ordered pancakes again. I’m not sure why. The food, I remember, was delectable. The mood was much less awkward than the first day in the pancake house, which I didn’t even notice because the conversation was flowing seamlessly. I liked my grandfather, and it was obvious everyone else was enjoying themselves as well.
On the last day of my trip to Chicago, my grandfather wanted to show us a few more sights. First on the list was the University of Chicago. The campus was both serious and inspiring, fresh, verdant, and full of brick buildings covered with vines and topped with orange roofs. I imagined what it would be like to study there. I imagined being classmates with alumni like Saul Bellow and Kurt Vonnegut. I imagined becoming friends with Larry Ellison and founding the tech company Oracle. My grandfather kept telling me that one day I could enroll at the university and live with him and it was clear that this was his fantasy. Before we left, we went inside the university gift shop and bought a few hoodies and sweatshirts of white and maroon, the school’s colors.
Afterwards, we went on a long joyride. We drove to Michael Jordan’s mansion in Highland Park at 2700 Point Lane, an empty palace worth 29 million dollars. The house was not open to the public, so all we could see were the front gates, decorated with the number 23 as we drove slowly by. We also drove by the house featured in the Home Alone movie at 671 Lincoln Ave, Winnetka. The house looked familiar, built in that colonial style so common in American movies. This drive was the most boring part of my trip, and I nearly fell asleep in the car at least twice as my grandfather was announcing trivia about these houses. There was a basketball court inside Michael Jordan’s house. There were six bathrooms in the Home Alone house. These facts were interesting, but I wanted to spend time with my grandfather.
When I look over the trip to Chicago, I laugh. We didn’t visit the standard tourist sites like Millenium Park, Navy Pier, or the Field Museum. Instead, my grandfather mostly took us around Avondale and Albany Park, visiting local Chinese restaurants and the friends he made in his twenty year exile from Korea. I realized that my grandfather’s tour of Chicago was showing us him: his immigrant dreams and his reality. He showed us his dream of economic mobility when he took us to the John Hancock Center restaurant. He showed us his dreams for his grandchildren when he took us to visit the campus of the University of Chicago. He showed us his fascination with American culture when he drove us to Michael Jordan’s mansion and the original Home Alone house. And he spent the rest of the time taking us to the places that gave us a peek into his everyday life. This was Chicago and Koreatown, the tiny version of the country my grandfather left twenty years ago before I was even born. Koreatown didn’t look anything like Seoul. The buildings were much shorter, the vibes of the people were more relaxed than the people I was used to. Chicago is a completely unique and lively city. And to me, Chicago is synonymous with my grandfather.
By: David Kim
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