“Crying In H Mart” Helped Japanese Breakfast’s Michelle Zauner Grieve Her Mother

Indie musician Michelle Zauner (leader of the band Japanese Breakfast) always had a complicated relationship with her mother, Chongmi. Michelle was born in Seoul and raised in Oregon, where she never felt like she was fully Korean or American. While it was sometimes hard for mother and daughter to understand each other, the thread that kept them together was their shared “Korean appetite,” as Michelle writes in her memoir, Crying in H Mart.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Dan Pashman?

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• 1:23Dan Pashman?

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• 1:32Speaker 01

  Ever since my mom died, I cry in H Mart. H Mart is a supermarket chain that specializes in Asian food. The H stands for hanarim, a Korean phrase that roughly translates to "one arm full of groceries." H Mart is where parachute kids flock to find the brand of instant noodles that reminds them of home. It's where Korean families buy rice cakes to make daku, the beef and rice cake soup that brings in the new year. It's the only place where you can find a giant vat of peeled garlic, because it's the only place that truly understands how much garlic you'll need for the kind of food your people eat. You'll likely find me crying by the Banchan refrigerators, remembering the taste of my mom's soy sauce eggs and cold radish soup.

• 2:18Speaker 01

  Or in the freezer section, holding a stack of dumpling skins, thinking of all the hours that mom and I spent at the kitchen table, folding minced pork and chives into the thin dough. Sobbing near the dry goods, asking myself, "Am I even Korean anymore if there's no one left to call and ask which brand of seaweed we used to buy?"

• 2:46Dan Pashman?

  This is The Forkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. I got some news. Next week, Mission Impossible continues with an all-new update. I'm gonna tell you what the first 24 hours after the launch were like. I'll answer your questions, and I'll try to figure out where I go from here. That's next week. Michelle Zauner is an indie musician who performs under the name Japanese Breakfast. To give you an idea what Japanese Breakfast sounds like, here's the song "Everybody Wants to Love You."

• 3:33Dan Pashman?

  Despite the name Japanese Breakfast, Michelle is actually Korean-American. She told Teen Vogue back in 2017, she picked the name by combining something she considers really American, like breakfast, with something she thought Americans would consider foreign. To her, that was Japan. Japanese Breakfast has released two albums, with a third coming out this summer. And for the last few years, in between making music and touring, Michelle has been writing. Now she has a memoir out called Crying in H Mart. That's who you heard her reading from at the beginning of the show. Much of it is a reflection on her relationship with her mother and the process of dealing with her mom's death. Food and its role in their relationship is a big part of that story. Michelle was born in Seoul. Her mother, Chang Mi, was Korean.

• 4:17Dan Pashman?

  Her father is American and white. When Michelle was one, they moved to Eugene, Oregon. When she was 10, they moved to a house in the woods outside the city, miles away from pretty much everything.

• 4:28Speaker 01

  I think I was a bit of a lonely child and I was very needy, particularly of my mother. And yeah, I mean, there weren't very many neighboring children nearby that I could play with. And no siblings. I spent a lot of time with my mom, who was a homemaker. I really relied on her attention. Or I think I also lived a lot in my, like, interior worlds.

• 4:54Dan Pashman?

  Sounds like she also depended a lot on you. You were a big part of her world, too.

• 5:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was definitely like her occupation, even though she wasn't like particularly a coddling mother. I mean, we were very, very close. She didn't have that many friends. So I was very much her world in a lot of ways.

• 5:12Dan Pashman?

  So when Michelle was growing up, she and her mom spent a lot of time together. And often, that time was spent eating. Here's Michelle reading another excerpt from her memoir.

• 5:21Speaker 01

  While she never actually taught me how to cook, she did raise me with a distinctly Korean appetite. This meant a reverence for good food and a predisposition to emotional eating. We were particular about everything. Kimchi had to be perfectly sour. Some gipsal perfectly crisped. Stews had to be piping hot, or they might as well have been inedible. The concept of prepping meals for the week was a ludicrous affront to our lifestyle. We chased our cravings daily. If we wanted the kimchi stew for three weeks straight, we relished it until a new craving emerged. I remember these things clearly because that was how my mother loved you.

• 6:04Speaker 01

  Not through white lies and constant verbal affirmation, but in subtle observations of what brought you joy, pocketed away to make you feel comforted and cared for without even realizing it. She remembered if you liked your stews with extra broth, if you were sensitive to spice, if you hated tomatoes. She remembered which banchan side dish you emptied first, so the next time you were over, it'd be set with a heaping double portion, served alongside the various other preferences that made you, you.

• 6:38Dan Pashman?

  Michelle and her mom were tight, but this singular focus on each other also bred tension. In an interview with Pitchfork, Michelle said, "I was always being told to calm down, to chill out, to slow down. I was a bad toddler, a bad child, a bad teenager. I felt too big for my environment. I just had this energy of like, I want to do what I want to do." In a feature on Spotify, she says the first song she was obsessed with as a young child was "Wild Thing." Michelle's feelings of isolation weren't just about being an only child living in the woods. It was also that she was one of the very few Asian-American kids around. She writes in her book that she told her mom, "You don't know what it's like to be one of the only Korean

• 7:19Dan Pashman?

  girls at school." Her mom's response, "You're not Korean, you're American."

• 7:24Speaker 01

  As an immigrant, I just don't think that she understood. Like, she raised her kid in America and she... I certainly, like, wasn't Korean, you know? So I think that that sort of anxiety, this like sort of dual identity that I possessed, was really confusing for me growing up and was something that I kept trying to convey to my mother that she just couldn't understand because she had never lived through that. And, you know, I think that her way of comforting me a lot was just kind of like being dismissive, you know? Like, I think that that was just her style of comfort, which, you know, sometimes was really aggravating.

• 8:03Dan Pashman?

  But it's interesting though, because on the other hand, you know, she would say, "You're not Korean, you're American," but then she would, you know, she was eager to share Korean food with you. That was a big part of your upbringing and her relationship with you. She took you to Korean language schools so you'd learn to read and write. So clearly, it was important to her to instill a part of that culture into your upbringing.

• 8:23Speaker 01

  Absolutely. I mean, it was a big part of her, everything that she knew. And of course, I think it's a really natural desire to like want to share that with your kid. And it was very much... Uh, something at an early age was really celebrated. Like, I think there were parts of her home country that she also didn't really like and didn't really see me, uh, in. There was this, like, real independent streak that she had that kind of went against a lot of the more, like, conservative stereotypes of Korean culture, um, in which she didn't really fit in. And I think that knowing me and raising me and finding that I was this very creative and very independent child, uh, in her mind, she was like, you are the farthest thing from what is gonna be accepted over there.

• 9:07Speaker 01

  And, um, the Korean community that existed in Eugene was already really small, but a majority of them were, like, really rooted in the Christian church. And I, I found it to be a lot more interesting later on in life that my mom really, like, removed herself from that environment because she just wasn't a very religious person. And I, in retrospect, feel like that was really brave of her because it must have been, like, very scary and lonely to, like, exit this community that you, it's like the only thing that ties you to your home and, like, your identity in a huge way, but is something that you've decided doesn't fit with you.

• 9:45Dan Pashman?

  I can see the choice to not be involved in the church community as brave, like you say. It, it also sounds like it could be a little rebellious.

• 9:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, definitely. I think that's another thing that I kind of learned about my mom and understood about her later. When I was growing up, my mom obviously thought I was very rebellious, and so I didn't really think of my mom as someone that could have also been like that in her youth. It was something that was, like, constantly told to me that my mom was this tomboy and that she was a bit of a party girl and, like, kind of directionless as a young adult. And it was always just, like, confusing to me because, like, my mom was someone that would scream at me if I, like, spilled something on the carpet or, like, didn't want me to ever have a sleepover.

• 10:25Dan Pashman?

  Michelle did see little flashes of her mom's rebelliousness when they returned to Korea. Every other summer, growing up, Michelle and her mom would go there for six weeks to visit family. Michelle describes those trips in her book. In one passage I asked her to read, she talks about just having arrived. They're at her grandmother's house, she and her mom are jet-lagged, it's the middle of the night.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  At home, I was scolded if I got caught poking around the pantry past eight. But in Seoul, my mom was like a kid again, leading the campaign. Standing at the counter, we'd open every Tupperware container full of homemade banchan and snack together in the blue dark of the humid kitchen. Sweet braised black soybeans, crisp yellow sprouts with scallion and sesame oil, and tart juicy cucumber kimchi were shoveled into our mouths behind spoonfuls of warm lavender kongbap, straight from the open rice cooker. We'd giggle and shush each other as we ate kangjang kejang with our fingers, sucking salty, rich, custardy raw crab from its shell, prodding the meat from its crevices with our tongues, licking our soy sauce stained fingers.

• 11:30Speaker 01

  Between chews of a wilted perilla leaf, my mother would say, "This is how I know you're a true Korean."

• 11:40Dan Pashman?

  Michelle says, as a kid, hearing that from her mom made her feel special, but it was also confusing. Sometimes her mother told her she was American, other times Korean. And Michelle didn't really feel like she fit into either. As she became a teenager, that need to break out grew stronger. She started drinking, doing drugs, missing school. She also got into music. She had taken piano lessons since she was five, but in high school, she ditched piano for guitar, really for rock and roll. She started playing in bands at school functions, then around town at real music venues. Her parents were initially supportive, until Michelle started saying she wanted music to be her career.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  I think it's like a really funny thing in Asian culture that like most Asian kids are forced into learning how to play piano or violin at the age of five, but God forbid that you actually like become interested in music. You know, she felt like it was her duty to dissuade me from this lifestyle that was not very realistic. She never went to college, and so it was really important that I went because she wanted me to have the opportunities that she didn't have.

• 12:46Dan Pashman?

  As Michelle writes in her book, she found out at a young age that her father was having affairs. She says, for most of her childhood, he was either away at work or at the bar. Today, she's estranged from him. So that pressure from her mom to go to college and pursue a more stable career, she understands it in a different way now.

• 13:05Speaker 01

  Maybe like she wanted some freedom from like not, you know, relying on my dad to provide for us. I think that she wanted to make sure I never was in that same position.

• 13:14Dan Pashman?

  But at the time, the growing distance between them was something Michelle didn't know how to bridge. In her senior year of high school, she had a nervous breakdown, which led to therapy and medication. She writes, "My mother was convinced all of it was a direct attempt to spite her." Michelle did end up going to college, about as far away as possible, Bryn Mawr, outside Philadelphia. On the East Coast, her passion for music grew, and she was slowly starting to repair things with her mother from afar. Then, her mom got sick, and their relationship changed overnight. We'll have that part of the story when we come back. Stick around.

• 14:22Dan Pashman?

  Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman. You want to win a copy of Michelle Zahn's memoir? Sign up for our weekly newsletter by April 30th, and you'll be automatically entered into this and all of our giveaways. We only send one email a week. Just want to give you some hot tips on what the Sporkful team is eating and reading or watching or listening to. Lots of good recs in there. Sign up right now at sporkful.com/newsletter. Now, back to my conversation with Michelle Zahn, whose new memoir is Crying in H Mart. Michelle graduated from college, stayed in Philadelphia. In 2014, she was living with her boyfriend, playing gigs and waiting tables. Then, just after she turned 25, she got the

• 15:04Dan Pashman?

  news that her mom was diagnosed with stage IV pancreatic cancer. Michelle moved back to Oregon to take care of her.

• 15:11Speaker 01

  My biggest fear always was my parents passing away, you know, because I was alone to deal with that. And I knew that there was always going to be this moment, that there was going to be this role reversal, that I had no idea it was going to come so quickly. And, you know, of course, like so much of caretaking, since you're a baby, is just...

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• 18:28Speaker 01

  Like, making sure that someone is fed and taken care of and is nourished.

• 18:33Dan Pashman?

  Michelle devoted herself to the task of feeding her mother, a reversal of the way it was for so long. Michelle figured she'd try to make some of the classic dishes she grew up with that her mother had made for her.

• 18:44Speaker 01

  But I never really learned how to cook Korean food because I never thought that I would have to figure it out so early. And on top of that, my mom was going through really intense chemotherapy and didn't want to eat a lot of the Korean foods that I associate with our culture, like really hot, really spicy, really cold, really flavorful, really garlic-heavy. You can't eat that kind of stuff when you're going through chemotherapy and everything tastes like metal and makes you sick.

• 19:13Dan Pashman?

  Is there a specific story you can share that you recall of trying to cook something for your mom?

• 19:18Speaker 01

  You know, it was already so hard for me to like, kind of think of something, but then I was like, oh, I'll make get on Jim, which is like this, it's like actually a side dish. If you go to like a really nice Korean restaurant, they'll give you a ton of side dishes. And if it's like really good, there's this egg custard. It's just eggs and water, basically, or stock. And it's like plain egg custard. And I was like, that's nutritious. It's a good source of protein. It's like very plain tasting. It's Korean. And so I made this thing. I'd never made it. I was so proud of myself. I made this thing and my mom was like, I don't want that. I would spend so much time thinking about this one thing. I put all my eggs, like literal eggs into one basket. And, uh, you know, she just didn't want it.

• 19:59Dan Pashman?

  How did that feel when she wasn't able to eat the food you were trying to give her?

• 20:03Speaker 01

  It was, it was, it was devastating, but it was also like, um, fear inducing. Like I had a real fear of failure of like, she's gonna starve to death. Like I need to like, figure this out. Um, so there was a lot of panic of, oh my God, she doesn't want to eat anything. And I, she's gonna like wither away. I had a real palpable fear of that.

• 20:24Dan Pashman?

  After two months of chemo, Michelle's mother decided to stop treatment. The cancer was spreading too quickly. Knowing there wasn't much time left, Michelle and her boyfriend Peter decided to get married as soon as they could. So Michelle's mom could be at the wedding.

• 20:38Speaker 01

  I remember my mom's friends made, uh, kalbi, which is like Korean short rib barbecue, often eaten for like celebrations and stuff. It's very decadent. I remember my mom like tasting her marinade and kind of coaching her of like how we wanted it prepared or whatever. And, and that being like a special thing between us, cause that was always what my mom made every time I came home from college. And so we were like, kind of like trying to recreate that for the celebration.

• 21:00Dan Pashman?

  Two weeks after the wedding and six months after being diagnosed, Michelle's mom passed away. How was your relationship with your mom when she died?

• 21:10Speaker 01

  Um.

• 21:12Speaker 01

  I think that for me, one of like the really truly heartbreaking parts of our relationship was like, it was just starting to get really good. And I think that that's like a real thing that a lot of girls with their mothers go through where it's a very natural thing to push away from each other in your teenage years and then like really go, go find some distance and come and return to them with this like newfound appreciation. And so one of the things that my mom said to me that I always will remember that was really beautiful to me was as we sort of began kind of returning to one another, she said, you know, I just realized I've never met someone like you. And I think that that was a really eye opening thing for both of us where we were just finally acknowledging that, um, that maybe

• 21:57Speaker 01

  there was a lot that we didn't understand about each other. And so that was like a real turning point in our relationship. And that happened when I was like in my early twenties, maybe 20, 21. And so things were starting to really get great. And my mother was beginning to confide in me as a peer. I, I had, you know, I think a lot of people in their early twenties have this moment with their parents where it was like, oh my God, you're a human being. Like, I thought you were just like, I thought you were just my mom. Like, and you realize you've had like this whole other life that doesn't even involve me. And you go through like all, you have thoughts that don't involve me.

• 22:28Dan Pashman?

  You mean, you still exist when I'm not here?

• 22:30Speaker 01

  Exactly. Yeah. It's like the tree that falls in the forest or whatever.

• 22:34Dan Pashman?

  Right.

• 22:34Speaker 01

  There was like this time in my early twenties when my mom started like telling me about her day and her life and stopped asking me question. Like, I wasn't the main, you know, it wasn't just her bombarding me with questions. It was like, this is what I did today. I'm having trouble with this. And it was like, I remember having this very specific realization on, on the phone with her when I was in college of just like, whoa, we're talking about my mom now. You know, it's like her turn to talk to me about her life. And, and that was really exciting. And it's unfortunate that we didn't get to have that for very long. But I also feel like, you know, after learning about a lot of people who have lost their parents at a young age, I am, I can be grateful at least that I got to spend a lot of time with her before she passed and really try my best to prove how much I really loved her. And I, and I would like to believe that she really

• 23:19Speaker 01

  knew that. And then that was where our relationship ended.

• 23:23Dan Pashman?

  Did she ever tell you that she knew that?

• 23:27Speaker 01

  One of the last things that she said to me when we were just like hanging out in her bed a lot was, you know, "As a child, you always used to cling to me, and here you are, like, you're still clinging to me." And that's always really haunted me because I feel like that was, in a way, like, her way of saying, like, you know, "I always knew that you really loved me."

• 23:50Dan Pashman?

  Her mother's death changed the way Michelle felt about the Korean part of her identity.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  I could always ask questions of my mother, and my mother always made me feel like she was the tie to that part of me, and so there was nothing to question of that. And now that she's gone, I don't have that to rely on anymore. If someone were to confront me about, like, something that was not Korean that I did or something, I could just talk to my mom, and all my mom would have to say is, "It is Korean." And I would just know that it is, you know what I mean? Because she is like, she has that kind of agency. But yeah, I think that, like, losing her, just, you know, was like, was a scary feeling where it's like I lost that half of myself almost. I don't have that sense of belonging anymore.

• 24:32Dan Pashman?

  So Michelle set out to rediscover that part of herself through food. She started trying to make the Korean dishes her mom made for her. Just one problem: Michelle's mom never taught her how to make them. So Michelle turned to Mang Chi.

• 24:45Speaker 02

  You know what I'm going to make? Dunejang jjigae, Korean fermented soybean paste stew. First, I'm going to use potato, peeled potato, medium size, around one cup.

• 24:58Dan Pashman?

  Mang Chi is a YouTube star, famous for her Korean recipes and videos. We had her here on the Sporkful last year, and this is a role that she's played for many people of Korean descent all over the world. We did a show years ago on international adoption, and we heard from Korean adoptees who used Mang Chi's cooking videos to reconnect with their roots. Michelle did the same thing.

• 25:19Speaker 02

  This is American standard, you know, measurement. I got this from Ikea, so cheap.

• 25:25Speaker 01

  I found her to be so charming and effervescent and so soothing, just her accent even. Just like reminded me of my mom and like, she just completely demystified this thing that felt like it had been withheld from me for a long time. And when I moved to New York a year later, I started cooking all these different dishes, and it was very comforting for me. And yeah, I just started going to Flushing and going to H Mart like every week, spending a hundred bucks on groceries and like watching these YouTube videos. It just became like this routine that was like really... Comforting to me, you know, and it was extremely therapeutic, uh, part of my grieving process.

• 26:00Dan Pashman?

  What do you think made it so therapeutic?

• 26:03Speaker 01

  I had so much unprocessed trauma, you know, like, I mean, a big thing I wanted to get across was like, it's really like an intense horrific thing to watch someone die. It's a really, really tough thing to like, see someone you love deteriorate their health. And that was really scarring for me. And because I hadn't spent a concentrated period of time with my mom since I was 18, it had been seven years since I like lived with my parents. And then this was like the last six months, I could really remember all of my memories of my mom were like of her being sick and that made me so sad. My mom would have hated for me to remember her as this bald woman with sores all over her mouth.

• 26:45Speaker 01

  And part of what was really therapeutic about it was like, I would go to H Barn and I'd be like, oh my God, they have red bean. And then I'd have this memory of red bean, you know, and like the summers that we ate popping soup or I would see like, or like I would see this can of like mackerel and be like, oh my God, I remember when my mom used to like cook this in soy sauce and sesame oil and she would eat it while we like ate American meals or something like on the patio table like, and, and, and so it was like this process kind of started opening up a lot of memories of my mom that had been kind of like buried by this trauma. And I realizing that I was like, oh my God, really drawn to like going there over and over again.

• 27:26Dan Pashman?

  Now, Michelle has learned to make a lot of the dishes her mom used to make for her. When she goes to H Mart, she's got a long list of favorite items.

• 27:34Speaker 01

  Some of them aren't Korean. I always get, I just love H Mart. I hope that they sponsor me someday. I probably spend like thousands of dollars there like every year. But, um, I always get.

• 27:46Speaker 01

  They have like a sushi section, like a sashimi section. And you can get like a big fillet of salmon, raw salmon. That's like fourteen bucks. And then like you just cut it at home and you have basically fifty dollars worth of sashimi. Like just from the grocery store, which I've been into. Um, I usually also buy Japanese mayonnaise, cupi mayonnaise. That has like the MSG in it. It's so.

• 28:08Dan Pashman?

  I got some in my fridge right now.

• 28:10Speaker 01

  Hell, yeah. Uh, I like mixing that with gochujang, which is another staple. It's like a, you know, fermented red pepper paste, Korean red pepper paste. And then my like big old man Korean thing that I love is um, ojingo, which is like dried cuttlefish. And you like roast it on the gas stove and it kind of curls up. It's like cuttlefish jerky, basically. And you dip it into this red pepper sauce with the cupi mayonnaise. And you have peanuts and beer. And that is like the ultimate old Korean man, like pub snack.

• 28:47Dan Pashman?

  And that sounds delicious.

• 28:49Speaker 01

  It's really good. And you're like jaw hurts so bad because you're like gnawing and like drooling on this thing. Uh, and yeah, I've eaten it since I was a kid and it's just like a really comforting. I love, it's really expensive, but um, I am super into that. That is a big thing for me. I used to really not be into perilla leaf. And I felt like a really bad Korean for a long time. So I actually have recently trained myself to like it. So I've started getting that for Korean barbecue as well.

• 29:16Dan Pashman?

  Okay, I, I feel like um, one of my favorites when I, I mean, I don't know much about cooking Korean food. When I go, I love um, bo-sam.

• 29:24Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, that's wild. That's one of those Korean things that I don't like very much.

• 29:28Dan Pashman?

  Really?

• 29:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're a more true Korean.

• 29:31Dan Pashman?

  Okay, I don't know if I'd say that.

• 29:33Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 29:33Dan Pashman?

  But um, but I, I know that sometimes it's, in some places they serve it with perilla leaf. In some places they, they go like more uh, western greens.

• 29:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, yeah. Uh, I'm not a big fan of it. I think it's kind of gnarly, but. It might be one of those things I need to train myself to, to like, because I have some shame about not being into it.

• 29:52Dan Pashman?

  Oh, well, I, I, I don't really have the authority to let you off the hook for that shame, Michelle. But I, if I, if I did, I would.

• 29:59Speaker 01

  Maybe I should, I should try it again.

• 30:06Dan Pashman?

  Michelle's grief changed her relationship with food and cooking. It also shifted something in her approach to music. In an interview with Wall Street Journal Magazine, she said, "I needed to write down and figure out what I was feeling. A lot of my grief manifested in an addiction to work." Soon after her mom's death, she began recording under the name Japanese Breakfast and released two albums. The first was Psychopomp in 2016, which Rolling Stone compared to Listening to a Lucid Dream. Here's a clip from the title track.

• 30:46Dan Pashman?

  Those last few seconds are a recording of Michelle's mother. Japanese Breakfast's second album, Soft Sounds from Another Planet, came out a year later. Here's the song, "Machinist."

• 31:07Dan Pashman?

  For the first time, Michelle's career as a musician is taking off. She went on a world tour, playing shows all over Asia.

• 31:14Speaker 01

  And then we ended the tour in Korea, in Seoul, where I was born and where my family is from. It was really, really special. You know, like I have one aunt left in Korea, my mom's older sister, and everyone else has died. And my aunt came, and before I went over there, I was telling her, you know, about the show and I told her, like, things were going well, but I don't think, you know, a lot of parents, like, really, or like, family understand, like, what you're doing until they get to, like, see what's going on, you know? She was, like, being translated through my cousin, and my cousin was just like, yeah, you know, she just, we're just, who pays you? You know, like, how do you get that?

• 31:51Dan Pashman?

  I get that question as a podcaster, too, right? Yeah, like, relatives, especially of an older generation, are like, so, this is a job?

• 31:58Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 32:01Speaker 01

  She was like, is it an office? Like, like a company that pays you? And I was like, oh, you know, people buy tickets to the show, and there's, like, a promoter, and then they, like, you know, give you, like, some of the door or whatever. And they were like, okay. And so they came to the show, and it was a really lovely moment where, like, you know, the show sold out, it was like, you know, it's like huge, it was like 500 people, like, in Seoul, which is pretty wild. And I just said, emo, this is like my jueza, which is like, my company. And it was like a very, a sweet moment. And you know, my mom's photo is on like the album cover and like her little paintings are on the discs and you know, it's really something very beautiful about all these kids in Korea, like carrying out these big cardboard squares of my mom's face out into the streets of Seoul.

• 32:45Speaker 01

  You know, it was a very sweet moment.

• 33:04Dan Pashman?

  That's Michelle's honor of Japanese breakfast. Her new memoir, Crying in H Mart, is out April 20th and available for preorder now. Her new album Jubilee comes out in June. This is B-Sweet, the first single off that album. And man, I cannot get enough of this groove.

• 33:30Dan Pashman?

  Hey, we're giving away a copy of Michelle's book. Subscribe to our newsletter by April 30th and you'll be entered to win. Subscribe now at sporkful.com/newsletter. And get psyched for next week, we'll have an update on Mission Impossible.

• 33:45Dan Pashman?

  This show is produced by me along with senior producer. Emma Morgenstern. And producer. Andre Sojero. Our editor is. Tracy Samuelson. The show is mixed by.

• 33:53Speaker 03

  Jared O'Connell.

• 33:54Dan Pashman?

  Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher. Our executive producers are Peter Clowney and Daisy Rosario. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.

• 34:04Speaker 03

  And I'm Fig in Chicago, Illinois, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.

• 34:30Dan Pashman?

  Hey, it's Dan here. Thank you so much, first of all, for tuning into The Sporkful every week. We really appreciate it. And I want to let you know, if you want to hear new episodes ad free, subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts Plus on Apple Podcasts or visit siriusxm.com/podcastsplus to listen with Spotify or another app of your choice. Thanks.