Tim Hsu, CIA Culinary Student

When I went to the FENI (Foodservice Educators Network International Conference), I learned that enrollment in professional culinary schools is soaring. This is true despite all the talk about how difficult it is to get a student loan. This led me to wonder: who are these students?  Who is going to culinary college and cooking school?

I decided to ask the students in my Professional Food Writing class to tell me about themselves and what made them decide to pursue a career using their interest in food.

I’ll periodically share a story with you. Today I’d like to introduce you to Tim Hsu, who recently enrolled at the Culinary:

“Once upon a time a boy named Tim thought that a six figure salary and job security was the path to happiness. So he studied and worked hard for many years to become a doctor. When he was finally able to tell his Chinese immigrant parents, who had sacrificed much to provide a quality education for their son, that he had been accepted to the medical school in Galveston, TX, the sigh of relief that followed could be heard several towns over.

Unbeknownst to his parents, who lived far away in China, Tim had been dabbling in the kitchen during his college years, and found himself watching the Food Network channel almost religiously.

He loved food and cooking—so much so that the night before he was to take the MCAT (the SAT for medical school), he had a mental breakdown; instead of studying, he filled out an online application to the CIA (Culinary Institute of America). He never submitted it.

Still, Tim had an ominous feeling he was making a terrible mistake by leaving for medical school without exploring the culinary career path. He asked the medical school to delay his matriculation and kept the real reason for doing so from his parents under the guise of “needing to take a break.”

After knocking on every single kitchen door in Austin, he got lucky and found a chef who was a CIA alumnus, desperate for a pantry cook. So Tim spent the next year working in a real commercial kitchen at one of the busiest hotels in the city.

During his stay, he met many cooks and chefs who all had their two cents to give about the industry. It ranged from a passionate “I love my job! I can’t think of doing anything else!” to a portentous “You’re still young—get out while you still can…” In the back of his mind, Tim had both of these thoughts at some point while working there.

A year passed, and he still could not decide. Every time he tried to sit down and think about it, he would become so exhausted by his own indecision brought on by his dreadful fear of failure and insecurity that his mind would shut down. He would escape by sleeping inordinately.

At the behest of his worried parents, he decided to quit and attend medical school. After all, how many people in the world have the opportunity to become a doctor?

The next fifteen months were the worst fifteen months Tim ever experienced in his short life.

They consisted of: infinitely boring lectures and fruitless hours of studying textbooks that did not interest him; sleepless nights agonizing over whether to stay or to leave; pages of insomnia-driven essays on what to do with himself; months of clinical depression, several therapy sessions, dozens of pills, and one deep contemplation of ending it all. Worst of all, he had the constant feeling of being lost with no hope of finding a way out of his dilemma—”money and security” or “passion and dreams”? Needless to say, it was a dark, dark time.

Sensing that all was not right, Tim’s parents moved back to the United States for several months in an attempt to support their son at school. Not wanting to disappoint the two people who gave him so much, Tim instead placed more pressure on himself, adding to the stress of being a good son.

In an unrelated cosmic string of events, in September 2008, Hurricane Ike blew through Galveston. It decimated the medical school, leaving hundreds of students displaced and homeless—Tim included.

His energy now completely depleted and with stress hormones at near-toxic levels, Tim experienced something he had never felt before: a total lack of motivation to do anything at all. Banned from returning to the island by the mayor of Galveston until it was deemed habitable, Tim moved in with his parents. He simply no longer cared about anything. In the weeks that followed, he slept, he ate, and then slept some more.

Then one day, Tim’s parents finally intervened. They came into his room while he was lying in bed staring at the ceiling. They took a good look at him, then said, “Tim, you used to be a happy kid. Now, you look miserable. You need to do what makes you happy.”

All Tim’s friends could have told him that, but for his parents—immigrants who knew what it is like to have little and to struggle, who came from a culture that values security over dreams, who were his strongest advocates for staying in medical school—for them to actually admit that…well, it meant something. The following day the ban on returning to Galveston was lifted, and Tim went back to his apartment to salvage what he could.

The place was utterly destroyed. His apartment had received two feet of ocean water. Any possession that had touched the ground had been washed away and anything left out exposed to the humid air suffered a blight of multiple varieties of hazardous molds and fungus.

Grim-faced, Tim looked around and saw his book shelf. In the most bizarre yet profound moment of clarity and enlightenment, his eyes were opened.  On the shelves below the top shelf, he had placed his heaviest and most expensive books:  medical textbooks, all now completely damaged by the flood. On the top shelf, he had placed his most cherished and valued books: cook books, the only books that managed to survive the flood’s purge and mold damage.

He had finally found the answer he had been seeking all these years, and it only took a Category 4 hurricane to find it.

Three months later, Tim withdrew from medical school and attended the Culinary Institute of America where he is writing this very story. After years of struggling with the question, he finally decided that pursuing dreams were more important than money and security. Although he has no idea how the story will end, he is certain of one thing: he will not regret the path he’s now taken.”

Will you share your story too? What factors led you to decide  to enter the food world?

Rene S. Leon, Culinary Student

I asked one of my students at the ‘Culinary‘ (Culinary Institute of America) to tell me how he fulfilled his dream to become a student at the CIA. His journey was long yet extraordinarily inspiring. This is his story  in his own words.

“My name is Rene S. Leon and I grew up in a small town in Ecuador.

My brothers encouraged me to go away to study in the city of Cuenca which is about a one hour’s journey away from my parents’ home town. I remember the day when they brought me to Cuenca for the first time. I felt so strange and dizzy with anxiety. Imagine me: a country boy arriving in what I then thought was a big city. I grew up where the only traffic on the roads were cows and sheep and dogs running in packs. In Cuenca, there was so much noise and the exhaust from the cars covered the city in a cloud of soot.

Almost  immediately I began to miss my home town of San Fernando. I was terrified because I had to face my first day of class with so many new faces and new teachers. I felt people were looking at me, and this made me feel even more intimidated. Everything felt new, even the air smelled and tasted different from my hometown.  The change from the countryside to the city was so enormous that it felt as though I was living a different language.  For example, in my home town at the high school, I only learned a few vocabulary words in English. I had no idea how to string together a complete sentence.

In my first year in Cuenca, I failed the English class and, in the second year I failed again. I was miserable. I felt as though the whole world was resting on my shoulders. I told my parents that I wanted to drop out of the school. My mother was angry with me and angry with the school but I could see the love for me in her eyes. My parents were frustrated because they weren’t able to help me. They didn’t want me to end up like them.

They always hoped that my brothers and I could get further along because their parents had never supported their dream of going to school. My mother dropped out in the fourth grade and my father made it only as far as the sixth grade. This is why they insisted I return to Cuenca and finish my education. I did manage to graduate, but even up to the last day I always hated English classes.

As soon as I left school, I made up my mind that I wanted to emigrate to America even though I didn’t have any money in my pocket. The job market in Cuenca was not great at the time. I  managed to find work in a fast food restaurant.  It was like a KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) but I earned only $28  a month and I needed $5,000 to  to get to the U.S.

It was impossible to continue dreaming.  But then I heard from my neighbor that they were hiring at his factory. I asked him if he would mind writing a reference letter so that I could apply there. He said, “No problem. I could even take you there!” I was so happy when I heard the salary was $95 a month. I felt a little closer to achieving my goal, but at the same time I was scared because I knew I had to improve my English in order to come to America.

A few months later I decided to borrow the money and come to the United States. When I arrived in 1995, I had to face the same terrible problem that I had in high school:  English!  And this time it was even worse because I had to learn the language in order to get a job. I was very lucky, though, because when I arrived here, my brother Danilo gave me his job.

It was the noblest thing that anyone had ever done for me. That job consisted of washing dishes. But even for this work, I needed English. Fortunately, things have improved since I arrived. I learned fast, and after eight years of hard work, I realized that I could move up the ladder.

I left behind a culture that traces its roots to the Incas (approximately 500 AD) where some ways of life still haven’t changed. Next month, I will graduate with a Bachelor’s degree from The Culinary Institute of America, the world’s premier culinary college.”

I don’t know what Rene will do with his culinary degree. But I do know that he boldly dared to take a risk to go after his passion in food and overcame obstacles that others would shrink from. For if you don’t ask for what you want, the chances of getting it are close to zero.

A brilliant culinary student named Bill Parks climbed on the bus to Phoenix. He was dead tired and looking forward to a long sleep. It takes nearly 19 hours to get to Phoenix from Albany, New York.

From his research, Bill had discovered that Phoenix has the best firehouse in the nation. Bill lurched to the back of the bus, stretched out across four seats and closed his eyes. Five minutes later, the driver tugged his shoulder and told him to sit up.  The bus would fill at the next stop. 

Sure enough a woman with a small child took the two seats next to him.  The child was crying.  The child cried all the way to Phoenix. Bill wanted to move to the front but every seat was taken. 

Wide-awake now, he rehearsed what he would say to the fire chief who was scheduled to interview him the next day.  In his pocket he carried the directions to the fire station and the instructions.  He’d been instructed to bring a duplicate copy of his job application and three references from his instructors.  And dress casually.
 
Bill was a super kid.  Handsome as hell.  Charming. Intelligent. Good-natured.  I’d bet him a dollar he would be hired on the spot.  He also was lucky. He’d known he wanted to be a fireman since he was a small boy.  He’d been a volunteer for three years and knew the ropes. Sure he liked to cook but the main reason he’d gone to culinary school to improve his chances of getting into the Phoenix firehouse.  He would be the firehouse chef as well as a fire fighter.
 
When I saw Bill in the classroom the following week, he told me I owed him a dollar.  I’d lost the bet.  He didn’t even have the interview.  The firehouse chief told him to get back on the bus. 

He’d worked for weeks to earn the $466.00 for the bus fare, the overnight stay at a cheap hotel and a spiffy new suit, shirt, tie and shoes. 

He didn’t get the interview because he hadn’t followed the instructions. He’d been instructed to dress casually.

According to the fire chief, a fireman who doesn’t follow instructions endangers his own life, the lives of his team and the people he’s trying to save.

Bill Parks’s dream went up in flames.