Soju

Meet my grandmother Ursula Chough! This picture was taken a few months ago on her 90th birthday while she was licking off her candles proving that we all remain children at heart. She is the true matriarch of the Chough family. The wisdom and knowledge she holds behind those kind eyes is truly immense. When someone tells me they have seen some s**t in their life, I think to myself, not like grandma. This lady has truly been through it all! She was born in North Korea, survived the Korean War, Japanese occupation, and immigration to the United States. She once described to me hanging onto the outside of a train as a child fleeing war, watching people loose their grip and fall to their deaths. After the war she had no home to go back to so she wound up in Seoul where she met my grandfather a member of the Korean upper class. I remember her telling me how his family looked down on her to the point where they would tell others that her children belonged to other members of the family in order to hide her. One of those children being my father Simon Chough for whom I share my name. He was their first boy and that’s a big deal in a Korean culture on some real sexist s**t (but that’s a story for another post lol). They immigrated to the United States with my father, in his early teens in tow. They left his older sisters in Korea for a few years to stay with family (see Korean sexism). She proudly raised six children here in Pittsburgh. They grew up to be doctors, priests, musicians, family court advocates, and long time employees of CMU. All having children of this own, creating more grandchildren and great grandchildren than I can count. After settling down here she even helped her parents immigrate here. I actually lived with them (my great grandparents) in the same apartment, above the Seoul mart in Oakland for years when I was a child. Her life could and should be made into a movie with Soju as a small footnote towards the end. The scene would be her walking through my dining room asking every Asian person if they were Korean and bringing me out to tables and scolding me in front of guests. Her cooking is my inspiration. Soju is really just my love letter to her!