Eric Shin was born in Seoul, South Korea in 1964. When he was 13 years old, he immigrated to New York City in 1978 because his parents had experienced the Korean War, which ended in 1953, as North Koreans, and they did not want their children to face the same hardships. With the help of Mr. Shin's aunt who had already settled in America by 1960, he immigrated to New York City with his parents and four siblings. In America, his father opened a golf retail store and then a dry cleaner's business, where he worked for the next ten years. Mr. Shin's first job was working in a sweatshop during the summer when he was 14 years old. He majored in history and philosophy at the State University of New York and then attended the Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Boston to become a pastor. There he met his wife and later became a pastor at New Life Fellowship (a Baptist church in Houston). He has three sons and hopes that they will be active in arenas that most Asian Americans avoid.
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