Hugh wavers between being loud and outgoing and then shy and reserved when doing interviews in English. He actually ended up being more outgoing in this interview, but not quite like his performance just before it.
Radio interviews always seems to come in groups. It will be months and months without any and then suddenly we have a whole bunch lined up. We did one with Asian Pop radio recently and have one with Arirang coming up and something with our local area in Seoul.
(And yes he wasn’t wearing clothes during the interview).
In this episode we film with other YouTubers, Hugh goes to the soccer, we go to SeoulTube, talk about if people stare at us and WHY DOES THE SIGN STILL HAVE PLASTIC ON IT? (Watch to see what I’m talking about).
Diagnosed at age 4 with rare liver disease, PSC (pscpartners.org) and ulcerative colitis. By age 8 (1995) received 1st transplant at Mayo Clinic in Minnesota but there were many complications, disease returned quickly.
Age 11 (1999) received 2nd transplant at Mayo. Lived for 3 years without the liver disease but had developed other problems like migraines.
Age 20 was put back on the transplant list. A third liver transplant was risky and I was not likely to get a liver. In America we mostly rely on cadaver donors (dead people) for organs. There is a strict system for how these organs are allocated and I wasn’t as promising a candidate as say, a child needing their first transplant. 2011 at age 23 I got the transplant, though. 5 years of relative health followed but I had developed more issues like arthritis, polycystic ovarian syndrome, fibromyalgia, chronic pain and more. It was during this 5 year period that I travelled to Korea for language school and ended up meeting my future husband. I moved officially to South Korea in 2014
My health was doing okay until one day in late July I had terrible abdominal pain and went to the emergency room. I was admitted to the hospital and it was discovered that there were all sorts of problems with my liver that hadn’t been there even 10 months previous. It looked like the disease was returning and I also had lots of infection, keeping me in the hospital for a month. As the situation got worse, we decided I had a better chance of survival by going back to Mayo Clinic in America. I was barely healthy enough to fly but I made it. Before I came I worked hard with my parents to set up insurance since I hadn’t lived in America for quite some time and hadn’t maintained any. I just had Korean government insurance that only works within Korea. It wasn’t until a day or so before I left that we found out we could not get insurance coverage for over a week. We did everything we could with the insurance company, even got the help of local politicians but there was nothing to be done. And I was/am in bad shape. I needed to be hospitalized right away upon arriving in America. My lack of insurance means I cannot afford to go to the hospital but not going to the hospital means being very risky with my life. Because we need money so desperately (even without the insurance problem this was going to be a huge financial burden) my husband has had to stay in Korea to continue making a paycheck but will come to America if the situation calls for it. If things here turn out to be long-term then we will consider him immigrating.
A friend of mine thought of starting the fundraiser on gofundme and I gave her permission. We never dreamed it would get so much attention. We all hate asking for money but are unbeievably grateful for what people have given. It will be put directly to use paying for my medical bills.
I actually really like tofu and it’s used so well in Korean cooking as a proper ingredient and not like a meat substitute in western cooking. Korean tofu is great too! But I just don’t get that automatic reaction of drooling at slabs of tofu on food shows that Hugh gets. I was just thinking about how I wish it was cheese. I’d be drooling if it was a big slab of cheese.
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