Tuesday, Oct 11 at 7:30 – Our October Great Presenter is Richard Lee. His talk, entitled “Building a New Home from the Old: The Immigrant Experience and the Things We Brought Over” will explore the personal journey of the Lee Family who immigrated to the US in 1975, the things they brought with them and the preservation of the old world into the new with hopes that people of different backgrounds, histories and origins may see their own experiences mirrored.Old photographs, handcrafted furniture, books in the old language, heirlooms, jewels or merely the shirt on one’s back, these are some of the things immigrants bring with them into the New World. They also bring with them old ways of doing things, methodologies, family structures, attitudes, ethics, faiths, sense of community and so on into the New World with strong aspirations and visions on forging new and improved lives here.
Richard Lee is a writer, visual artist and humanitarian. He has worked as a freelance journalist for various international outlets including the Associated Press, The Times and The Sunday Times, UK, Dow Jones Newswire and the Korea Times. His poetry has been published in literary journals, and he has exhibited multimedia installations and film collaborations in Cambridge and New York City.
Richard was eight-years-old when he immigrated to Northampton, MA from Seoul, Korea. He has been a resident of Wayland for six years and lived for over 20 years in nearby Newton. He helped to form Wayland’s Human Rights, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion committee in which he currently serves.