Lee Jae-si, daughter of former national team soccer player Lee Dong-guk. [YouTube capture]
Lee Jae-si, daughter of former national team soccer player Lee Dong-guk. [YouTube capture]

Lee Jae-si (19), daughter of former national team soccer player Lee Dong-guk, has explained why she decided to take a leave of absence from her university just three days before she was set to leave for the United States.

A video titled "I took a leave of absence" was posted to Lee's YouTube channel on Wednesday.

In the video — her first upload in about seven months — Lee said she had completed her studies at the Korean campus of her school. "It's not an official graduation; I finished the Korean campus program," she said. "The plan was to go to the New York campus and study for two more years, but I ended up taking a leave of absence."

Reflecting on her time as a student, Lee said she had enrolled at 18, about two years earlier than most of her peers. "If I just went straight to New York, I felt like I'd be missing out on experiences I could only have in Korea," she said. "I thought it would be fine to go after gaining a year of real-world experience first."

Her family's advice also played a role in the decision.

"My whole family tried to talk me out of it — they kept telling me to go to New York a little later," Lee said. "Most of my classmates are older than me, and they kept saying New York will always be there, so it's not too late to go after building up some experience in Korea and figuring out a clearer direction."

Even so, she initially held firm on going to New York — until practical concerns got in the way.

"The exchange rate was going crazy at the time," she said. "I thought, if I go to New York like this, it's going to wipe out my family." She added that, as the eldest daughter, she could not bring herself to let that happen. "Rent in New York is expensive, and everything there costs so much," she said.

Lee ultimately decided to delay her move to New York by a year and gain work experience in Korea instead. She was candid about her current situation, saying she is "basically unemployed right now."

Lee enrolled in 2024 at the Songdo campus of the Fashion Institute of Technology (FIT), a prestigious fashion school based in New York, and recently completed the program with strong grades. Her plan to continue at the New York campus was abandoned just before her departure — a fact that came to light through a social media post by her mother, Lee Su-jin.

Her mother said she had told Lee that spending two more years solely for a diploma might not be the right call, and that the time and money could instead be invested in broader experiences. "I had a long talk with her, saying that if she combined the two years of real-world experience she had already built up with studies alongside peers her own age, she would be a completely different person by then," the mother said. "In the end, Jae-si came around to my way of thinking."


betterj@heraldcorp.com