140 Quotes by Mary H.K. Choi

When I was five, I compound-fractured my arm, pulverising my elbow.

Consider this: alms aside, Wikipedia is fueled by competitive pedantry and emo-ness. How great is that?

I'm great at leaving. I am less talented at getting left, though I should be better, given how much it's happened.

Manhattan, after eight years here, still reminds me of Hong Kong. There are parts of Chinatown that are the spit and image of streets in Wan Chai, and I am held in thrall by the Chrysler building as much as I was by I.M. Pei's Bank of China Tower.

For my first job interview out of college, I wore a cream-colored cotton suit with cap sleeves and an inverted box pleat skirt that was appropriate for the late-August heat - and wildly discordant with the Red Hook offices of the graffiti magazine I had called twice to find.

I cannot quantify the physics of friendships and do not know exactly how much intense pressure can be applied before these glittery, brittle bonds break.

I was born in Korea and left before my first birthday.

In New York, you collect a thousand encounters a year, a passel of handshakes, a zillion air-kisses, and boatloads of business cards that you pitch into your purse and eventually deposit your chewing gum into. Amid this break-neck montage of glancing contacts, I'm tormented by the constant thrumming fear of being fingered as a flake.

Home is where my house pants live. And they're hideous.