A seemingly permanent smile affixed to her face, Heein Kim strolled across the campus of San Marino High School on a beautiful morning, with sights set on drama, the first class of this late start day. ‘Peter Pan’ is Drama Director Blake Williams’ selection for the school’s musical, so very soon we might be fortunate to watch Heein fly across the Neher Auditorium stage in some capacity.
It’s a posture to which the senior is accustomed, but typically she leaps skyward without the assistance of ropes and pullys. Hapkido is a martial art borne to her Korean heritage and one that runs deep in the veins of her family. Heein has trained in the craft for more than a decade and a half of her young life.
“Basically because I was born into it,” she said with that trademark smile.
Her grandfather, Chong Sung Kim, founded the family’s Jang Mu Won Kim’s Hapkido Association in 1960 in his home country of South Korea, and moved to the United States in 1972. A year later, he established a school in Alhambra. Heein’s father, Han Woong Kim, created a studio of his own in 1992 in South Pasadena.
Last month, Heein advanced to third degree black belt and was officially promoted as an assistant instructor under the Jang Mu Won Association. She has been leading and assisting classes since she was twelve years old, when she received her first degree black belt.
“I have taught people of all ages,” Heein said. “I thoroughly enjoy teaching people, no matter how difficult it might be to work with certain individuals. It truly brings me joy in life when the little three to five year olds give me high-fives and hugs at the end of a class, or when the adults tell me they truly enjoyed their workout that day.”
The teacher also competes. And with a great deal of success. For the past two years, she has won the grand championship for the black belt demonstration division.
“The trophy is taller than I am,” she said with a laugh.
Heein also won the grand championship for the black belt women’s sparring demonstration division, though she will be unable to defend her title due to a scheduling conflict.
With the body control and discipline necessary to compete at the highest level of the martial arts, it’s no surprise that Heein succeeds in dance.
“I started my freshman year, not only for P.E. credit, but also because I really wanted to try dancing,” she said. “I think doing Hapkido all my life helped me a bit with my coordination, as I was able to skip a level and enroll in the Intermediate-Advanced class for my sophomore year.”
Scheduling conflicts precluded her from participating in dance, but Heein is starting her fourth year in San Marino High School’s Drama department.
“I am pretty sure I have participated in every single show that the department has put on since I got here,” she said.
Heein is also a four-year veteran of the Choir program, the senior class vice president, president of the Self Defense & Fitness Club—which she personally founded last year—and a cabinet member of San Marino High School’s Green Club. She is also a self-described “foodie” with interests in fashion and photography.
She chuckled at her own answers to two questions. When asked where she wants to attend college, she mentioned “I want to stay on the west coast. Or go somewhere on the east coast.”
Her areas of study were equally as disparate.
“Political Science. Or Early Human Development.”
Full on laughter.
Whatever path—where it starts and wherever it leads—will be a successful one for the daughter of father Han Kim, mother Stevie Kim, and older sister to Duin, 15, and Suin, who is ten.
Of that there is absolutely zero doubt.
