I was home schooled with my mom until the age of 7. My dad’s business was doing very well, so we had the biggest house that was isolated at the edge of my village. I didn’t have much interaction with people outside of my house because my mom told me that people in the village gossip a lot and we should stay away. One of my favorite things to do was to look out of the window and watch other kids play. Sometimes I would daydream about running around outside with them instead of spending so much time by myself.
As a matter of fact, when I finally went to school, I didn’t even know how to interact with my classmates. When I finally adjusted to the environment three years later, I had to transfer to a bigger town and start all over again with a new group of people and new group of friends.
Ten years ago when I moved to the U.S., I spoke very little English and barely had any interaction with non-Chinese people. I had lots of culture shocks. I remember one of my co-workers hugging me to say goodbye and my face turned tomato red. I was not used to that. I met a lot of friends from different cultures and was very curious as to how they grew up and what kind of food they had at home.
I used to feel uneasy about my background. I felt embarrassed about all of the things I didn’t know about this country. However, since I didn’t know the culture, I was always interested in getting to know more. Sometimes I heard people, that grew up in New York, talk about their life and say that they have experienced so many things to the point where nothing excites or surprises them anymore. I think I am in a very different state of mind and I want to keep the same amount of curiosity towards new cultures just like I did the first year I was here.
I apply the same philosophy with a lot of other things, such as building sundays studio and the nail polish collection. We are very new to the market and have a lot of things we need to learn and improve on, which makes me very excited about our future and it means we have a lot of space to improve.
I would like to end with one of my favorite quotes: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish”
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