Bonjour.

Scenes and memories from London and Paris

The kids wrapped up school for the year and hours later, we were at the airport. I don’t know why we planned their summer trip this way. It was like something dreadful was closing in on Los Angeles and we were escaping just in the nick of time. We had to flee the country.

I think I was around my teenage son’s age the first time I visited Europe. My parents, Korean immigrants, feel most comfortable traveling to foreign countries if by Korean tour with Korean tour guides and Korean tourists. These buses are such a specific part of the 2nd-generation Asian-American immigrant experience. For an American kid, the idea of a European vacation conjures visions of sailboats on the Riviera, prancing with the Griswolds in the Alps, or sharing a chianti with Diane Lane under the Tuscan sun. For a Korean-American kid, we knew nothing of the sort.

It could be Venice, Paris, or London, but it might as well have been Seoul. We’re trapped on stuffy tour buses, immersed in the Korean language, surrounded by people who look like my parents, and eating at hole-in-the-wall Korean cafes that subsist primarily off of the Korean tourists. My parents would bond with the other passengers over lunch: Koreans from Brazil, Koreans who’d moved to the States in the ‘70s like them, and Koreans from the motherland who never sold out! Sipping the cold broth from metal bowls, slurping buckwheat noodles, and colliding aluminum chopsticks in the fermented banchan. Meanwhile, my brothers and I - disgraceful little American shits from the bowels of Southern California - would refuse to eat kimchi jigae stew for lunch in Paris when the sweet aromas of a warm boulangerie tantalized us from next door. At gas station rest stops in Italy, we’d indulge in ham and melted cheese sandwiches on stiff baguettes in wax paper. On the long bus drives home, the tour guide would pull out a cooler of ice cold beer and pass brown cans out to the dads. One by one, they’d take the microphone and croon karaoke songs as the kids would nod off in the back rows.

My tourist relationship with Europe has adjusted over the years, primarily because of business, tradeshows, and fashion week. Over the last couple decades, The Hundreds benefited from strong distribution in territories like the Netherlands, Germany, and Scandinavia, still some of my favorite regions to visit. I associate most every destination with food. Oslo, Norway for the shrimp toast, lathered with buttery mayonnaise. Berlin for the lemon-sprinkled schnitzel, of which I still can’t find a comparison back home. It’s the Korean in me, but I do love the herring served as street food in Amsterdam, decorated with chopped onions and sliced pickles. Tilt your head back. Down the hatch.

Parallel to the food, my impressions of these cities are most colored by the friends and mates we’ve met along the way. There are individuals I shared one conversation with at a party 17 years ago that have left as much of an impression as a partner we’ve worked every day with. We’ve watched streetwear bloom and wilt and recover in its own way on this continent. I miss some of the pioneers like Nicky and KJ from Bond who set the tone here and welcomed us onto their shelves. I think a lot about the first Bread & Butter tradeshows we exhibited at as a nominal American streetwear label against the backdrop of the global denim trend. I’m grateful that we get to celebrate our 20th Anniversary this Thursday at Starcow here in Paris. Starcow has always been our backbone here, even when larger fashion retailers have acknowledged us and closed doors. For Ben and I, some of our favorite memories are sleeping on Fred’s couch in the suburban outskirts of Paris, waking up to the dewy air and stillness of a small town. Fred’s girlfriend is curled over the table, rolling cigarettes. We’re trying to shake the jetlag off with mineral water.

Deep down, I think I was in such haste to travel with my sons here because I’m ready to plant new stories. I’m eager to start a different relationship with Europe, one seen through their eyes, but also in my role as a father who has a different sense of responsibility and guidance. For the first time in years, I wasn’t here for work or fancy meals. I felt the gravel crunching under my sneakers as we walked the Luxembourg Gardens, felt the piercing heat on the back of my neck as we waited in line for the Eiffel Tower elevator. For the first time, I visited Disneyland Paris. I said it was for the kids, but really, it was for me. There was nothing streetwear or fashion about it. It was silly and pointless and in a roundabout way, inspiring.

My family left for Los Angeles a few hours ago. Meanwhile, our team is now just arriving to Paris as Fashion Week begins. In the morning, I fly to Cannes for the Lions festival where I’ll be speaking on a yacht. And before I know it, I’ll be right back at it again. Parents always joke that traveling with your family is a “trip” and not a “vacation.” There really wasn’t much restful about this last week or so as we lugged baggage onto trains and got food poisoning and were smothered by a freak heat wave. But, it was one of my favorite weeks in memory. I feel like I grew up a bit.