Yoon moved into the room across from mine, the second international student in our dorm. I was the first; packed up my life in Shanghai and came here for boarding school two years ago. Yoon often sat alone at lunch, staring at the rotisserie chicken before returning it barely touched. One night, I ordered from Kaju and knocked on his door.
His desk was cluttered with empty Haitai chip bags.
“Kimchi soup and rice?” I asked.
The umami smell filled the room.
Yoon suddenly said, “I miss rice,” and burst into tears.
I nodded, shoving a chopsticks-full in my mouth.
Oscar Zhu ’27 is in his lower year at the Academy. This piece was originally published in The New York Times on February 13, 2025, as one of 20 winners in the paper’s third annual 100-Word Personal Narrative Contest.
This article was first published in the spring 2025 issue of The Exeter Bulletin.
