난 우리 아빠 에게 Jaeger-LeCoultre 시계를 드리고싶다1

근데 10,000 불 을 어디서 구할까?2

I want to buy my dad a Jaeger-LeCoultre watch. My mom bought him a new suit once,

for his birthday. A navy-blue Ralph Lauren suit and trousers with a blue shirt and matching

silver cufflinks.

He only wore it once for my graduation. We took pictures together at the Grove, but no

one saw him wear it outside of that... my graduation was a drive thru event due to COVID-19.

He never even left the car.

He was so happy when he tried the suit on in the store, excitedly going through our

selections in the dressing room (something he seldom does). And he looked so handsome—and

we made a point of saying so, at which he grinned and smiled, relenting to our determination to

“treat him to something nice.” And on the night of his birthday—because we withheld the

purchases until then—he unwrapped the same suit and shirt and cuff-links—but something had

changed within him. It was subtle, but I glimpsed it after he had pulled off the tags and tried on

the ensemble once more in our living room. A look verging on shame and disappointment,

although perhaps those words are a bit harsh for the subtlety I witnessed then.

My dad’s a humble salesman. Not even the business type. He wears golf clothes to work:

a pair of blue Adidas pants and a black company polo shirt.

1
Kor. I want to buy my dad a Jaeger-LeCoultre watch
2
Kor. But where can I find 10,000 dollars?
 He has a closet, a sparsely furnished closet, with nice ties and button-down shirts he

hardly ever wears. Mementos from his past, from when he used to have use for them.

He was a bit of a big shot back in his heyday. During dinner he would open up photo

albums and portfolios of his works and his youth, as if to show his daughters “Hey, what you see

now, isn’t the full story of who I am.” He used to be a graphic designer. Worked for ELLE and

E-Land, went on business trips to Europe for fashion magazine shoots, collected model cars and

gave inspirational speeches. He tells us funny stories about how there used to be a fan club for

him among the ladies during college—and I believe him.

My dad is handsome, like an actor. In fact he could, and most certainly should, be cast in

a Korean drama or film. He has a lovely singing voice, and he strums the guitar effortlessly and

hums romantic tunes. He has sad eyes, but they’re soft and sweet—rounded. I have his eyes.

He’s tall and gaunt, but not garishly so. It’s a nice kind of skinny on a man. He’s kind—his wry,

shy smile he flashes when he’s embarrassed, is endearing. He looks and feels frail at times, but I

like him even still that way.

He wears cologne from a blue bottle that he’s had for ages, yet it has strangely not run

out. I love his smell. He smells of stability, security. He smells clean and well-groomed. Maybe

it’s the after-shave, or his soap... but I feel safe and protected by his scent. It’s familiar and

consistent.

After years spent as a graphic designer for notable companies such as E-Land, my dad

eventually came to own and operate his own video game company. He must have looked really

cool back then—in his suit, with his hair swooped back—my father the business man. And then

his company went under. A bit melodramatic, like a Korean drama, but that’s life I guess. His
best friend ran away with company documents and money... or at least, I think he did. I’m not so

sure about the details; my parents don’t like to talk about it. I guess the wounds are still too fresh.

I was three when our family made the move from South Korea to America. That’s about

when the business went under, I’m assuming.

I remember playing The Prince of Egypt, a video game his company developed, in

America with our cousin. The avatars looked so beautiful, and my favorite was the pink-haired

Helen (I think that was her name) who had a fire breathing dragon as her aide. I also thought the

blue-haired Moses to be so handsome, with his magical staff that emitted something blue and

fantastical. And of course, there was the orange-haired guy who fought with a sword—the

disadvantaged character who was hard to win with. My cousin, sister, and I all made fun of him.

My dad was working on a second game, something to do with angels, destined to remain

unfinished because his company shut down. We always pestered our dad about when we’d be

able to play the angels game, the chief voice of this grievance being our cousin—a funny fellow

who was sweet, but lacked diplomacy and sense at times. But he was charismatic, and so the

impressionable little me echoed his cries for the angels game, even though I was perfectly

content with playing The Prince of Egypt. And every time we asked, our dad only gave a wry

smile in response, and we were too young to understand that meant not to ask anymore.

It must have been rough for them, my parents, to start all over from scratch. But I didn’t

know that back then. I was selfish and greedy, and I wanted to live in a single house with a pool

and a puppy. Those were the three things I prayed for at the dinner table every day until I was

about seven. When I was little, I didn’t really understand the situation we were in—financially or

citizenship-wise. But there were times when I thought we were poor, and perhaps in that period
of time we were. Of course, these thoughts didn’t arise till I was much older, about fourteen or so

when classmates began to brag about pencil cases, pens, and lunchboxes. Only in the pessimism

of hindsight do I even think to cover up my memories with monetary labels and symbols, but I

was a happy child growing up. My parents raised me without any wanting, spoiling me with their

unconditional love and affection whenever and in whatever ways they could.

Within the first five years of making the move to America, my dad used to bring home

toys for me that I was way too old for. A plastic microphone, an ugly green puppy doll, a giant

Tweety Bird puzzle. I still remember him walking into our cramped apartment in Dearlove-

Cove-Lane, bundled up in his black winter jacket, hat, and gloves. The tinted yellow lights of the

place make my memories appear golden, like a scene out of A Christmas Carol movie, or maybe

the opening scenes of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. He’d present me with these random

gifts on random days, with no ceremony and a cool nonchalance. But he always had on a wry,

shy smile as if he knew he did something right. And I feigned excitement, infatuation, and love

for these gifts I received, purposefully eating dinner with the ugly green doll pressed under my

arm or singing into the plastic microphone for my parents as if I were in a talent show.

I didn’t know it then, but I believe now from deduction that these things were from a flea

market in Chicago. I don’t mind it. I love thrift stores and buying secondhand goods, and if

anything this makes me appreciate his gifts all the more. It’s sweet… that he’d shift through piles

of garbage for me in the cold, and stupidly, kindly, pick out things he thought I’d like—not really

knowing what I like. But the fact that he gave them to me made me like them, treasure them.

Our family is filled with failed businessmen. My maternal grandfather was a wealthy fish

merchant back in South Korea. Tuna is expensive, or so I hear, and he apparently had fleets of

fishing boats for catching tuna and shrimp. He surely made enough to afford our grandmother’s
arsenal of jewelry which, considering she’s sold a lot of it already, must have been a sizeable

amount. I can still remember my grandparents’ house. A golden palace of chandeliers and long

winding halls where my sister and I frolicked about in a plastic toy car one finds at a

supermarket. People say kids can’t really remember all that much at the age of two or three, but I

remember it all: the elevators leading to the third floor, the lush leather furniture, the varnished

wooden statues. But all of that disappeared when a giant flood hit Korea, ruining my

grandfather’s business. And so he moved to America.

My late-grandfather, my dad’s dad, was apparently very wealthy, although I don’t know

what he did. I never knew him except through photographs and stories my dad tells of him, and

the stories my mom sympathetically whispers into my ears out of our dad’s earshot. All I know is

that my dad grew up living in the largest house in his neighborhood: on a lofty villa with a

private acre of land with a waterfall and river. But when my dad was in middle school, the

business failed and his family went from extreme wealth to poverty... something like that. Our

dad never really made clear the details of the situation in his accounts, but perhaps he was too

young to understand everything at that time as well.

Our uncle owns a screen-golf company in America that isn’t doing too well. They’ve

moved locations three times within the last eleven years, and whenever I visit the place it’s

always embarrassingly empty. The concrete walls make the building feel unfinished, and the

rudimentary cables and projectors do not scream too much enthusiasm for their cause. Mostly

church members and friends of our uncle visit that place, and seldom do I ever see any new

customers. I think our family should stop pursuing entrepreneurship.

My mother is a musician: an organist for our church and a private piano teacher. She

drives our silver mini-van to each student’s home, approximately three students a day, and
practices six hours at church on the weekends. Little mystery why her wrists and back ache. She

used to play in giant concert halls in Korea, and went to Northwestern University as a transfer

student. Her parents (my grandparents) were wealthy and could afford such a thing. She even

studied abroad in Germany. Back in the 1990s or 2000s, it took a lot of money for a Korean to do

that. She told me that in Germany there are adorable shops that sell dollhouse miniatures, and

that when she studied there she’d look longingly at the store front windows and think about how

lovely it would be if she could buy a dollhouse set for her children. We never did get that

dollhouse.

And my dad, who plays around with investments and stocks to make ends meet—who

goes on “business trips” where he has to drive for five days straight across Indiana to Illinois as a

door-to-door salesman selling hair supplies. Who used to own his own company and could afford

all of the well-crafted, well-tailored suits and clothes he leaves fossilized in his closet.

Looking back at our family tree and all that they were and all that they could be, I’m

convinced that our family is cursed. Cursed because both my parents, my mom and my dad,

grew up in wealthy households with big houses and dogs. Cursed because their parents came

from nothing and built up their own empires, only to have them fall—surely wealth skips a

generation within our family.

But when their fortunes ran out and our family made the jump to America, my parents

worked until they both broke their backs and were bedridden for weeks. Months. And when they

got up, we knew they weren’t truly healed yet, but they still carried on for us. My parents paved

the way for my supposed chance at success, as my grandparents and my parents had tried their

hands at. And if the curse rings true, surely the stars are aligned in my favor, at least for a certain

period within my lifetime.

 I wrote in a letter to my dad once, that when I became older—perhaps a bit more wealthy

or wise—I’d treat my parents as kings and queens. I want my dad to be happy and comfortable. I

don’t want him to drive across Indiana on 24 hour drives, or lifting heavy boxes at the age of 56.

When I left home for university, I found a magazine in the library. The Economist. Inside

the cover page was an advertisement for Jaeger-LeCoultre, and I immediately knew my dad

would look so handsome in it. The image was of a single watch on top of a starry, shining navy

backdrop. It had three different dials along with the main watch frame—one for the date, month,

and the moon cycle, where there were stars and moons of golden metal that changed and turned.

It was whimsical and masterful.

The thing about these types of things is, they don’t ever really show the price on the

catalog, especially when the price is something absurd. I went online to find the watch I had seen

in The Economist and found that it was part of the “Master Collection”; the particular model I

was looking for being approximately $10,000. And I had an aneurism. The reality that some

people lived at such levels of wealth was incomprehensible to me. That somebody in the world,

had enough money to drop ten grand on a single watch. The same amount of money that could

pay off my entire year’s tuition. The same amount that could feed a person for a good three years

or so.

But even though I knew, know that the price is absurd, I still wanted to buy my dad a

Jaeger-LeCoultre watch. Not that I believe in all that—in the prestige of wearing luxury goods,

or the misconception that “you get what you pay for.” It isn’t a pride thing or a nobility thing

either—to want to be rich or flash around wealth, throw it around like that, on a watch. And at

the end of the day this is all just a fantasy. Because consumerism at that level is nuts, and

because the reality and prospects of such a future is bleak and uncertain.
 But I just knew that he would look so handsome in it. And he would be so proud to wear

it. His daughter, the youngest child, who could comfortably afford a Jaeger-LeCoultre watch.

Because he’d never accept a gift if it cost all the money I had to afford it.

I want my dad to be the type of man who wears a Jaeger-LeCoultre watch. The type of

man who belongs to it, looks right with it, and lives accordingly. And he does belong to it, and is

more than deserving and fit for it.

He’s handsome. Effortlessly so. And the effortlessness of it all makes him all the more

lovable and handsome. And that simplistic fashion which suits him so well, that minimalist style

he carries around with such charisma and dignity—all the more elevated by the embellishment of

a gorgeous watch on his left wrist. And those with keen eyes and much wealth will notice and

compliment him on his Jaeger-LeCoultre watch, and he’ll flash his perfect teeth and with a

sparkle in his eyes coyly, embarrassedly say, “It’s a gift from my daughter.” And people will

respect him and treat him with dignity. They won’t ridicule his Korean accent or roll their eyes at

his hard time understanding English. They’ll treat him kindly and with compassion as he asks for

people at registration desks and cashier counters if they could, “repeat that again?”.

And he loves me so much, like a baby. And I am the baby of the family. He adores me

and endears me. He spoils me with gifts and toys that I’m still way too old for, but I treasure

them anyways. Like a Woody doll from Toy Story 4, a recent movie we watched together. Or the

Elsa barbie doll he got me for my birthday... a bit demeaning to my high school age, but I still

found it lovely. He still considers me his little girl—and I like that a lot.

And someday, on a summer day, I’ll travel to Europe like my parents did. I’ll go to

England and France, Germany, Russia, Greece—Switzerland. I’ll walk down the Champs-
Élysées or the streets of Zürich, eyeing down the petite storefronts and arbored streets until I find

the store I’m looking for.

I’ll enter, taking my pair of black sunglasses elegantly off my face, holding lightly onto

my cross bodied bag as my high heels clap lightly on the marbled floor.

And I will tell the pretty lady at the store, “Je voudrais une montre pour mon père.” And

she’ll start to ask questions as any good saleswoman would, and I’ll shyly, coyly tell her with a

blush on my face, “Je pense que mon père est le plus beau dans le monde.”

And she will blush and sweetly show me around to exactly what I want, the watch with

the moon and stars.

And I will ask, “Combien?” to the pretty lady, and just then the store owner will emerge

from the back office. So touched by my tale which he overheard from his workers, he will say

“free of charge” in a thick European accent, and I will feign surprise and gratitude—but this was

my plan all along. He’ll personally wrap the watch up in a beautiful box, with Jaeger-LeCoultre

wrapping and place them gently, masterfully into a freshly creased white bag.

…..

But this is just a fantasy.