By Emmy Trivette, News Editor

A year and a half ago, sophomore Kat and senior Adam Livingston were eating a regular family meal, in a regular seafood restaurant, when they were asked a very regular but slightly random question by their parents: “If you could move anywhere, where would you go?”

So Adam, just for the heck of it, said “South Korea.” A moment after, their parents quickly – and not discreetly – share a shocked look.
They would’ve never guessed that in three months their new home would most likely be Seoul, South Korea.

“They didn’t tell us until five months after they’d been interviewing,” Adam said with a laugh.

But for these siblings, sudden and drastic moves like this are old news. For 20 years, before either was born, their father has acted as head of customer service for multiple corporations. Because of this travel-heavy job, the family has lived in places from Russia to California, with Luxembourg and Ireland in between.

Since a mobile lifestyle is all they’ve ever known, these two new members of FFHS and their younger brother, Alex, are more than comfortable receiving what most would see as life-changing news.

“(Living overseas) is eye-opening,” Adam said. “For a lot of people who live in the States, (America) is their whole world since the media shows that everything revolves around us. But it’s a completely different world wherever you go.”

Living in South Korea only made that more apparent. Having never been to Asia, Kat and Adam found that the social customs, dress and food really contrasted to Western culture.

“It feels like in America the way you make friends is more about what sports you do, or what art – in Korea, it’s more about what academics you do that make you popular,” Kat said.

Even though the siblings eventually grew excited about the big move, their first feeling was nervousness, for several reasons – the first obviously being the ongoing conflict between South and North Korea and what might happen if the tensions came to a climax. But mostly, Kat and Adam were concerned with assimilating to a completely new culture.

“There aren’t a lot of English speakers and everyone was so scared we were going to get trouble from North Korea,” Kat said of the reaction friends and family had when learning about the move.

The international school in Seoul the siblings attended was paid for by their dad’s employer, web corporation Coupang. The school was initially for international students only, but housed a surplus of Korean kids who had spent only a year or so in America.

While neither Kat or Adam expected this new high school or its culture it to be even remotely similar to their others, some of its differences caught them by surprise.

The two entered their first day of school in their casual Oklahoma dress, while other students were donning Gucci and Coach. Their new grading system went from 1-7, and their little brother received his grades in colors. They were accustomed to the new and different, but all the same – it was extremely new and different.

“I didn’t understand what it was like to be the minority until I moved to South Korea,” Kat said. “Mostly everyone is Korean, and then there would just be my family. We’re super tall, we’re very white and loud.”

Still, the Livingstons had been there, done that, as Adam could attest from his middle school years in Ireland.

“We were the only Mormon kids in the Catholic school, so the nuns didn’t like me very much,” Adam said.

Nonetheless, the siblings both agree that for a year, Korea – like Ireland before – was their home. And they, like any kid missing their home, still have the fresh feeling of homesickness as they settle into new lives on the OBX. Adam will admit to missing the popular Korean cabbage dish, kimchi and Kat reminisces over little Korean quirks she finds around her new home on the beach.

This is their first time living at the beach despite seeming to have been to the four corners of the globe. To be more specific, the Livingstons have lived in California, Utah, Virginia, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Texas, Luxembourg, Ireland and South Korea.

The siblings have been moving around with their family since they were born – if they’ve calculated it right, 10 times exactly – so by now, they’re pros. Each time they’ve been sprung with the news of their next home, they buckle down and begin their classic travel routine.

“Either mom or dad will go out and house hunt, and then me and my dad will do the more physical stuff, like packing,” Adam said. “My dad will get a poster board and sticky notes and we’d design our new home from that. We’d draw out the whole house.”

Kat and Adam both agree they’re incredibly lucky to have been able to grow up in countries as amazing as Ireland, Luxembourg, South Korea and America. And while they don’t want to stop experiencing the many cultures around the globe, they will always miss and cherish each life they made for themselves in each new home: from Kat’s favorite pancakes in Luxembourg, to childhood games they played at their hilltop home in Ireland and the spiciest ramen bowl Adam conquered in South Korea.

Even after they move on, ties to each country remain.

“Now we have friends from all over. There’s been a lot of connections,” Kat said. “Some people think it’s super scary, but somehow it’s always worked out for us.”

Junior Emmy Trivette can be reached at [email protected].