I was born in Seoul, South Korea, on 7 October, 1963 (there are stories about what life was like in South Korea in my youth in the Prologue of my book, Bad Samaritans). I came to the UK as a graduate student at the Faculty of Economics and Politics, University of Cambridge in 1986. I earned my PhD in 1992. I have been teaching economics at the Faculty of Economics (as it is called now) and the Development Studies programme at the University of Cambridge since 1990.
I still keep my Korean nationality, but Britain is now my second home. I am still not convinced by the weather and cricket (as a good short-tempered Korean, I don’t have the patience for a game that lasts for five days), but I have come to like HP sauce and Branston pickle.
I live in Cambridge with my wife, Hee-Jeong Kim, and two children, Yuna, and Jin-Gyu, who sometimes feature in my writings, but with no dog (most British authors seem to live with a dog – or three).
