Hey everybody, Dylan here.

Today, we're bringing you another essay from Off Assignment.

This story ran in their column called Letter to a Stranger.

It's written by Cat Lewis, who writes to a restaurant worker

and reckons with race and the meaning of home.

So, once again, Atlas Obscira goes off assignment.

Here's the episode.

When the sky opened with a storm, rain came down like an animal.

Standing under the awning of Chopat Sadang, I squinted through the sheets of falling water at my apartment complex,

a squat modern building overshadowed by the skyscrieping high-rises of Mapol. My building was close enough to see, but still on the other side of the park I knew to be filled with low-flying dragonflies in autumn and hungry feral cats in spring.

Now it was summer, and a year of calling soul my home had dwindled to a number of days I could count on my hands.

There, in front of my favorite restaurant, umbrella-less before this sudden storm,

I was reminded of home, of Florida for the first time in months.

But this reminder came with no comfort, no nostalgia, no solace, only the realization that I had

no interest in going home striking me like lightning.

For the first few months I lived in Seoul, I was terrified to leave the house.

Beyond the front door of my apartment in Kongdok were crowds of ajumas and ayesis who would openly gape at me,

impeccably dressed people who would snap photos of me on subway platforms,

slack-jawed children who would stare up at me until I looked them in the eye and said,

Anianasayo.

I understood them.

I too could go weeks without seeing another black person.

...