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memorizing 10 new words a day, but
he struggled with the language. To
earn extra money, he waited tables
on weekends at Eden, a nightclub
in Manhattan’s Koreatown. He
dreamed of opening his own restaurant in Korea and carried a notepad
to write down ideas for dishes he
would someday serve, his sister said.
By last April, Hwangbum’s life
was starting to come together.
He had graduated from culinary
school, received his green card
and found a job as a cook at The
Modern, a restaurant at the Museum of Modern Art owned by
famed restaurateur Danny Meyer.
“He was working very hard to
get what he wanted,” Sunah said.
“I was really proud of him.”
But around 1:30 a.m. on April
19, police knocked on Hwangbum’s father’s door. Kyung Sik
Yang, who doesn’t speak English,
called his brother to help translate. Then he called his daughter.
“He said my brother had passed
away,” Sunah said. “I said, ‘Don’t
joke around.’ He was crying. My
whole body was shaking.”
After Hwangbum’s death,
neighbors placed carnations on
the sidewalk near where he was
shot — a steep one-way street
bordered by a park and brick
HUFFINGTON
03.24.13
REPORTER VIDEO HED GOES HERE
homes. Sunah avoids the spot
because it causes her to imagine
her brother’s shooting. “Instead,
I try to imagine that my brother
is traveling around the world, and
I’ll see him again soon,” she said.
On a recent Sunday afternoon,
Hwangbum’s parents sat in a quiet
room on the second floor of their
church. His mother held in her
hand a wallet-sized photo of her
son. In it, Hwangbum wore a white
button-down shirt and a straw hat
and stared intently into the camera.
“It’s like he’s always beside
me,” Hyun Sup said, speaking in
Korean and fighting back tears. “I
miss him so much.”
Hwangbum’s father said his
friends often encourage him to
buy an iPhone because they say
it’s more convenient than his older-model cell phone. But he tells
them he never will. It would be
too hard. “If I bought an iPhone,”
he said, “I’d think of my
son whenever I see it.”
HuffPost
reporter
Gerry Smith
discusses
why the
iPhon