Guest: Alexander Kim
Interviewer: Chris
Duration: 40 minutes
Recording Date: May 26, 2009
Alexander Kim is a 4th generation Korean Russian from Khabarovsk, a city in the far East of Russia. His ancestors came from what is now North Korea and with the onset of World War II his family was deported from the East to Central Asia, far away from Japan. Upon recognizing the misdeed it had done, the Russia government offered to relocate ethnic Koreans back to the far East. Alexander grew up in Khabarovsk, a city of around 600,000 people, with few other ethnic Koreans around as he was younger, but a growing community.
In this interview, Alexander discusses growing up as one of two ethnic Koreans in his school, developing an interest in learning Korean and moving to Korea, his life in Korea studying for an MBA with a full scholarship from the National Institute of International Education and developing a desire to settle permanently in Korea.
