Korean family duties

My wife and I aren't hard-core TV fanatics, but we do have two sessions each week of "must watch TV": Gilmore Girls on Tuesdays (it's funny!), and CSI and Without A Trace on Thursday nights.

Last night's episode of Without A Trace struck a nerve with me: The episode dealt with a Korean family running a deli in New York, and the disappearance of the grown-up daughter of the family. (I won't spoil the plot for you, if you're interested in finding out what happened stay tuned for re-runs.) A large part of the plot deals with the daughter and her brother, both grown-up, and both dealing with the demands of responsibility, having to work at the deli in order to support the family. Their father was in ill-health due to a recent stroke, but even without that complication the two children had been working at the deli for years, probably since they were young teenagers.

I am Korean, my parents have owned businesses in the past (they're retired now), and yes, I worked at these businesses since my teen years. It was something most of my friends, who were all non-Korean, could never really understand. They would ask questions like: Why couldn't I hang out with them after school, or at certain times during the weekends? Why did I have to work at this store, especially since I wasn't even being paid minimum wage?

For me, it was just part of the way life was. The store was our only source of income, and there was no way my parents would be able to handle those long hours, 7 days a week, on their own. For me, it wasn't a choice of vocation or a desire to get some extra spending money -- it was our family's survival. All of our businesses were profitable, but never successful enough to hire outside help, so there we were.

And if I ever felt like complaining, I would reflect on the fact that no matter how hard I worked at the store, my parents always worked much harder, and who did they have to complain to?

It was an interesting episode of Without A Trace, and it definitely struck a chord within me...although I would have enjoyed it more if the actors portraying the Korean family actually were Korean. I don't think I've ever heard a more atrocious accent speaking Korean words...could they not find actual Korean actors to play those parts?