Our guest today is a young man who went to the UK, as a high schooler, without speaking any English, and later came to the states for college.

We interviewed him to explore what it was like to grow up alone without parents by his side, and his relationship with them. But his story was so complicated that we realized the interview was not able to present the things that he experienced. His journey is so far away from our own lives, and we once again realized how limited our mindsets are. Because of this, we decided to turn the microphone to him and let him narrate his own story in the way he saw best.

We would like to extend our gratitude to the guest today for his incredible trust and generosity to share his memories. We plan to dedicate 3 episodes to him. Please subscribe and follow us if you don’t want to miss his story!

If you have been with us for a while, you probably have heard the story of Mrs. Yam, talking about how she and her family fled from the Cambodian genocide in 1979. That was the first time we touched on the topic of refugees. You can find the links to those two episodes at the end of this description.

These days, the refugee crisis is rising again. The conflict in Ukraine has highlighted the crisis of displaced people globally who are seeking safe haven. More than half a year ago, the Taliban took over Afghanistan. 76,000 Afghan refugees fled from their homes to seek shelter in the U.S, 300 of them settling in Washtenaw county. Ann Arbor’s Jewish Family Center is helping to shelter these refugees and provide necessities for them. One of the volunteers willing to go the extra mile is Mrs. Semra Koknar, a Forsythe middle school social studies teacher.

Today we had the opportunity to interview Mrs. Koknar about her work in helping to support the various needs of the refugees. Every step they take in a new country is a challenge. The scenes that Mrs. Koknar described of the difficulties that the refugees had to face were heartbreaking and horrific. We were humbled to learn how much time and effort she puts into her volunteer work, while still being a full-time teacher.

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Mrs. Yam's story:

S01 E04 - I Came from Cambodia, 1979

https://rss.com/podcasts/thisperson/308775/

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-person-i-met/id1584722816?i=1000540344724

https://open.spotify.com/episode/2oytJRspwZ9ce3oQ4dQzo2?si=115197ffbd68426d

S01 E05 - A Non-American Dream

https://rss.com/podcasts/thisperson/319251/

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/this-person-i-met/id1584722816?i=1000542032884

https://open.spotify.com/episode/38i2n0D0Ho50d83YgQ0Lea?si=3af840bf70494c60

Since the last episode, we have been working hard to fundraise for Athena and her family. Because of your kindness and generosity, we have reached our goal of $1,000. For those of you who don’t know, each episode we have produced so far takes huge amounts of editing. But this episode we are presenting today provides the raw, authentic, unedited voices of our peers around us.

We are working on a big episode that will be produced in about a month, that involves the delicate relationship between parents and their children. It’ll be a striking story that you definitely don’t want to miss, but that interview raised the question we are asking everyone in this episode: What is one thing you’d like your parents to know about you? You’ll hear their extremely genuine responses in the next few minutes.

To the interviewees: thank you and we appreciate your contribution!

To the tiger moms and dads out there: have a splendid day! :)

The guest we’re having today is a girl we met right before Christmas. It all began with a friend’s mom. In that season of “gifting,” she commented ruefully on how we were ungrateful for living such a privileged life. Then she shared with us the story of this girl. This girl is our age, lives in our town, goes to school daily as we do, but the home she goes back to is a shelter.

We contacted the girl, hoping to know more about her life. So here comes this episode. To protect her privacy, we will hide her real name, and silence many others appearing in the conversation. For these reasons, allow us to borrow the name of Athena. Athena was originally from Detroit, and now she lives in Ann Arbor with her Dad and brother.

After hearing her story, we started a GoFundMe fundraiser, hoping that one day, when she moves into her new home, she and her family can enjoy a housewarming gift. $1000 is our goal. Please click the link below to donate; any contribution helps!

https://gofund.me/120606e6

THANK YOU!

Music has always played massive roles in both of our lives, taking up large portions of our afterschool time, but we’re definitely not alone. In fact, more than 40% of high schoolers in the US are active music learners. Derek Wu was no exception. Even after leaving home for MIT and eventually landing a job as a software engineer at Google, he remained extremely committed to music.

Instead of doing a quick google search to find 100 benefits that music has to your brain, we choose to talk to Derek, a great aficionado of classical music. Today, he’s answering our “soul searching question:” why we are learning music, and what it takes to stick with it, enjoying a lifelong relationship with it.

After our last interview with Mrs. Hilton about her son’s Spina bifida, we hoped to learn more about what science can and can’t do to lessen the chance of or prevent birth defects. So, we turned to Maya’s Dad, Professor Fu for some answers.

But due to our severe lack of knowledge, the interview with Professor Fu was . . . traumatizing, to say the least. We were completely burned out trying to ask smart questions, or trying not to ask stupid questions……but at the end, the answers we got were definitely worth the effort.

Sometimes the hardest thing to do and the right thing to do are the same. One would never need to think about making a decision like this until it comes to you.

Today we have Mrs. Hilton with us sharing critical decision-making moments for her son, Carter. Mrs. Hilton is a teacher at the Thurston Elementary School in Ann Arbor. Seven years ago, Mrs. Hilton was a new mom expecting her first baby. During a routine ultrasound exam, doctors brought her and her husband the unexpected bad news: the baby had a rare and severe defect. A revolutionary surgery in her womb might bring hope to her baby. However, that surgery had never been performed in the state of Michigan. Stay with us as Mrs. Hilton narrates hers and Carter’s ongoing journey with this birth defect.

Meet Alicia, our second guest sharing their high school experiences. She gave a powerful and inspiring speech at her high school graduation. We hope you enjoy our conversation with her as much as we did!

As you may know, both of us are new high schoolers. Life is changing for us. There are so many sports and clubs to explore, new friends to make, and other new responsibilities. We’re both juggling so many commitments, and sometimes, begin to question the purpose of our busy lives.

We, therefore, invite a few University of Michigan students to this podcast to share their high school experiences. Some focused on sports, while some took time to explore various possibilities in a young life. They all navigated through their own uniquely different paths, but all came to (or stayed in!) Ann Arbor for college. We’re hoping to gain more insight as to how to traverse through these young years from people with first-hand experience.

Our first guest Selina is a freshman at the University of Michigan. She is multi-talented in music and an outstanding athlete who has spent thousands of hours on the ice in her high school years. She holds the Guinness World Record of most figure skating sit spin rotations in one minute!

If we, Maya and Zach, have one thing in common, it’s that we’re both dog lovers. Maya’s beautiful Havanese dog, Allie, has been with the family since Maya was nine. Today we brought Allie to her birthplace, up north to Alger, Michigan, where Connie and Tom Diehl live in a secluded home with a separate lake, cabin . . . and lots of teeny tiny, wriggly, freaking adorable puppies.

In today’s interview, Connie will be sharing the ins and outs of dog breeding: her relationship with her dogs, and what a huge responsibility it is to be a dog breeder. Out of love and continuous learning, the business has grown into more than just a business, but a loving home.