Ansan is the first city where a Community Regeneration Support Center was built. In many villages in Ansan, parents take the initiative in creating an educational environment for their children by investing money to operate childcare centers, study rooms for elementary, middle, and high school students, etc. in the form of a cooperative. I have been living in Ansan and raised my kids with my neighbors as well. After the sinking of the MV Sewol in 2014, local residents conducted cultural regeneration activities in order to support the student survivors and families of the victims particularly in the villages where many victims had lived (Gojan 2-dong, Wa-dong, and Seonbu 3-dong). Artists in Gyeonggi-do held a variety of exhibitions and performances and carried out various projects to mourn over the death of the victims of the sinking of the Sewol ferry and to console their families. Organizations including Healing Space Neighbor, 4.16 Workshop, and Salt Bus Cooperative have been making efforts to comfort and care for the families of the victims and local residents.

Ansan has a good cultural foundation. The Ansan Arts Center which opened in 2004 has been fulfilling the cultural and artistic needs of citizens through a variety of performances and academic programs. The Ansan Cultural Foundation has been holding the Ansan Street Arts Festival each year and the 13th Festival was held in 2017. During the festival, numerous artists visit Ansan and perform remarkable street performances. Such festival is made possible thanks to the enthusiasm of small and large cultural and arts groups in Ansan and activists who are striving to improve the living culture. On the other hand, there are only a few policies supporting culture and arts which provide support to centers for the youth, and youth groups in Ansan.

Read Us CEO Ahn Yong-jae smiling broadly in front of bookshelves filled with books.

Fortunately, various types of youth organizations centering on support groups such as Youth Cube and Cheongdam that opened last year are conducting independent activities. Youth Cube is a startup incubation center founded by the City of Ansan to support the independence and growth of the youth. Ansan set up two camps (Youth Cube Seoul Institute of Arts Camp: Gwangdeok Market, Wolpi-dong, Youth Cube Hanyang University Camp: Hanyang Town, Sa 3-dong) near Seoul Institute of Arts and Hanyang University Erica Campus by leasing vacant buildings and considering the specialized features of the universities such as IT, cultural and arts contents, etc. In the camps, 30 teams amounting to a total of 102 young people moved in 30 rooms and are preparing for their own startups through education, consulting, community, etc. Some of the members of the camps include Abiento (Gleam), which makes special gifts; meet&er, which is involved in creative activities such as design and publication; Play & Village, which prepares for plays and arts education; and Hanhunsik Notes, which does volunteer work for the underprivileged through performances.

Cheongdam is an incubating center for the youth founded by the Ansan YMCA. The Ansan YMCA remodeled its office and rented out the space to young artists at no cost even without a deposit. Six teams consisting of young artists are utilizing this space by only paying maintenance fees and performing a variety of arts activities such as design, photo shooting, etc. In addition, they are actively involved in community activities. Read Us, which I will introduce today, is closely related to Cheongdam.

A Book Saves a Person’s Thinking

Read Us, which was founded in July 2015 and had their inauguration ceremony in December of the same year, is a new youth startup, just marking its first anniversary. Read Us resells donated used books at reasonable prices and uses the proceeds for the educational welfare of underprivileged children and teenagers. Its slogan is “A Book Saves a Person’s Thinking.” Read Us CEO Ahn Yong-jae majored in theology and served as a youth secretary of the Youth for Christ (YFC) for six years as part of missionary work. He always wanted to help, “in depth,” teenagers from broken families who live in group homes. He thought what those children really needed was to find a “dream.” In particular, he was able to help them through education using books and that is why he founded Read Us. Read Us was situated in Cheongdam until September of last year. In October 2016, it became qualified to move in to the Ansan Social Economy Center (3F, 20, Gwangdeoksanan-gil, Youth Cube Seoul Institute of Arts Camp is also located at the center) and relocated to the center. This year, it will upgrade itself by obtaining the Social Enterprise Certificate. (Hereinafter Q&A)

Q : I realized that many young people are trying to start their own businesses in Ansan. When did you plan to set up your own company?

Ahn Yong-jae, hereinafter referred to as Ahn I did a lot of volunteer work at church. Naturally, I wanted to help my underprivileged neighbors and had a dream to establish such a group. That is why I founded Read Us. At first, I didn’t intend to provide education or sell books; I just wanted to help underprivileged people. So, I pondered over what children really needed. Then, I realized that they don’t have any dreams. It seemed there were few movements to help underprivileged children find their own dreams whereas there were a lot of material aid such as clothes and food. So, I wanted to establish such an organization and came up with books.

Q : I think it must have been quite difficult to realize the volunteer work. What made you do this?

Ahn I majored in theology and had been involved in missionary work thus far. Ever since I was a high school student, I did a lot of volunteer work at Ansan YFC by helping underprivileged children in terms of religious beliefs, leadership education, and counseling. But, I became aware of the limitations. There was a gap between the rich and the poor even in volunteer work and some people who really needed aid couldn’t get any. I wanted to solve such issues. I thought I should set up a group myself, so I started this company. But I didn’t know it would be this difficult. (laughter) I was able to start it because I didn’t know anything. Of course, I don’t have any regrets.

Q : Please introduce your members.

Ahn Our employees are referred to as secretaries. I, as CEO, lead our secretaries and share our values with them. Our work is largely divided into book sales and donations. Secretary Jo Song-hyeon is in charge of sales and manages the donated books and establishes sales strategies. In addition, the Secretary deals with distribution and is focused on making profits. Secretary Lee Myeong-ju is in charge of Donations. She shares our values with others and takes care of publicity. She is also in charge of design. Secretary Jo was one of my students when I served as a missionary of the youth group at church. He had good values and grew up early. (laughter) He always seemed to thirst for change, so I asked him to do this together. When the two of us worked together, Secretary Lee just came back to Korea after finishing her working holiday and applied for volunteer work. She was so great that I offered her a job here.

Q : Your office relocated from Cheongdam to Social Economy Support Center.

A : Ahn We have four members including myself, and soon the old office became too small for us. Above all, we needed a warehouse for the books. It was very competitive to move in the Social Economy Center. We had an interview and gave a presentation. It was very difficult to get in here. Once we got in, everything turned out so great. The Head of the Center let us use the multipurpose room, so we could keep all the books there. Before that, we kept some books individually because we didn’t have a place to keep them. We now have about 3,000 books in storage.

Q : It has only been one year.

 Ahn I still have a lot of things to learn and a lot of things to do.

Q : How long have you been interested in volunteer work?

 Ahn I didn’t realize that helping others would become an interest of mine, but looking back on my childhood, I was good at empathizing with others ever since I was a student. I couldn’t turn a blind eye to the poor. I thought I just had a soft heart, but I realized later that I had this outstanding empathic ability. (laughter) When I was in high school, my friends who didn’t have any dreams used to talk to me about their uncertainties. When we were young, our dreams were directed towards our future job. So, I used to give my friends advice on their future jobs. I guess I’m doing this now based on such experiences. I don’t know why. I don’t have any clear reasons, but I liked listening to others and helping them find their dreams.

Q : Do your parents support your work?

Ahn I think they support me about 70%. But they always worry about me. I have to get married this year. (laughter) They worry about me because I don’t earn a lot of money, but they say that the work I’m doing is very valuable and they are always proud of me. Maybe I am able do this thanks to their support. Most of my friends just started their careers and draw salaries from their companies; I’m the representative of a volunteer group, so my parents worry about my circumstances. In fact, they didn’t want me to major in theology. However, I always expressed to my parents that I really wanted to help underprivileged neighbors.

New Read Us Office in Social Economy Center they moved in to October of last year. Donated books piled up in the corner of the office. Social Economy Center’s multi-purpose room being used as the donated books warehouse. The warehouse currently contains about 3,000 books. Read Us provides book reading education for children living in group homes. (in order)

Happy Contents in which We can do Something “Valuable Together”

Q : Why did you decide to base Read Us in Ansan?

Ahn I have been living in Ansan since 2001. I think I’m quite attached to this city.

Q : How was it like?

Ahn I’m helping group homes. A group home is a sort of a household children’s shelter. Up to seven orphans live in one group home. I had lived in Ansan for a long time, but I had never heard of the term “group home” before. I learned about group homes while I was running Read Us. I was surprised to learn that Ansan is the city with the largest number of group homes in Korea. Before we moved in Cheongdam, we used my place as an office so we just hung out by ourselves. In Cheongdam, we met like-minded young people and realized that there are more young people who care about neighbors without looking out for themselves than I expected. Once I sometimes doubted if hope actually existed. In Cheongdam, I learned that the world is full of hope and young people are still alive. In particular, we get along with Doors and People and Hongcha Bubu Photo Studio. We hang out with them a lot and even held a workshop together with Hongcha Bubu Photo Studio. Not only does Cheongdam provide a physical space, but they also offer a platform for the youth. I learned a lot. 

Q : What made you start a business with used books?

Ahn I love used books so I am very interested in them. Recently, more and more people buy and sell used books. Even though the current social phenomenon of the rise of the single-person households and a fixed book price agreement promote the used books industry, it was not an easy business for me. (laughter) If we just verbally ask for help from people or deliver our values in writing, people generally don’t pay any attention to us. So I thought it would be great if we could include our values in widely used products. At that moment, used books came to my mind. I was involved in book reading education. So I realized if we deliver our values to those who are interested in books and those who buy books, they may pay more attention to us. At first, I was afraid only a few people might donate books. Many people who buy used books do not tend to collect books but resell them after reading. If you resell used books, you get only a small amount of money. So we came up with the slogan. “Donate your books instead of getting a small amount of money.” Thankfully, people donated a lot of books.

Q : How many books did people donate?

Ahn Approximately, 10,000 books thus far. We donated some books to patients of Bundang Jesaeng Hospital, children, and group homes and also sold some. We have about 3,000 books remaining. I hope we will have our own online used book store, but few people know our brand, Read Us. So we are selling used books through the mini shops of popular online used book stores. We are utilizing four websites now: Aladin, Yes24, Interpark, and Kyobo Book Centre. We upload books to the four websites at the same time. If a book is sold at one website, we notify other websites that the book has been Sold Out. Our dream is to open our own online and offline book stores in Ansan. When we first founded Read Us, we started with zero capital. So, we still don’t have enough of a budget. (laughter)

Q : It sounds like you went through a lot.

Ahn Our employees receive really small salaries; only a little bit higher than transportation expenses. I cannot pay them even the minimum wage. We can run Read Us together because we are all activists and consider our job as volunteer work.

Ahn giving a presentation at Cheongdam. Book donation and donated books (in order)

I believe that culture is not a tool for your own happiness or wellbeing but a tool to enjoy with your neighbors together and happy contents in which we can do something “valuable together.”

Q : What is your goal this year?

Ahn One of my biggest goals is to obtain the Preliminary Social Enterprise Certificate. If we can afford it, I really want to do this first. If we get certified as a preliminary social enterprise, we can receive some support funds for personnel and business expenses. It may be a driving force for us to run this business for a long period of time. In 2016, we entered a lot of contests. We wanted to gain some experience and start networking. As a result, we kind of neglected our main business which is book donations and sales. This year, we will focus on our main business. In addition, we will improve our processes and strengthen our organization.

Q : Volunteer work and business, they seem to contradict each other. It also sounds like a pretty difficult project.

Ahn You should keep yourself cool and take decisive action well to engage in business. However I’m not good at those things. (laughter) I think that makes a social enterprise more difficult to achieve. You need to chase two hares, profits and values. But it’s worth trying. I want to break the stereotype that business people should not have a volunteer spirit but only seek profits.

Q : Popular business people we know focused on social values instead of chasing money.

Ahn Such culture has already been formed abroad. But it is difficult in Korea because many Korean people still put a high value on money and fame. So it’s more worthy to try.

Q : Who is donating used books?

Ahn Mostly it is individuals who donate books the most and some groups such as book clubs and churches donate used books as well. We set up two strategies this year. Recently, more and more people are joining book clubs. So, our first strategy is to create an atmosphere where book club members can do something good. The second strategy is to connect book clubs and churches and to receive used books and donations in line with sharing our values. So we visit book clubs and churches a lot these days. Thankfully, many people empathize with our work and willingly donate their books.

Q : What kind of support do you think the youth need most?

Ahn We need practical management education. For example, we need practical mentoring programs for tax affairs, leadership, and HR management. Many programs provided by local governments are unpractical. I think we need more practical education. In addition, activists need support funds to keep doing their work. Support funds we are currently receiving is only for business development expenses, promotional expenses, etc. and we cannot use it for our personnel expenses. Of course, some people may use support funds for themselves. So, that is why the authority should review the qualifications of applicants thoroughly. We really need support funds to take care of our personnel expenses.

Q : What do you think cultural regeneration is?

Ahn I used to work as an instructor at Ansan YMCA Culture School. During the class, I told this to my teenage students. Culture is not a tool for your own happiness or wellbeing but a tool to enjoy with your neighbors together. In that sense, I think that cultural regeneration and culture are happy contents in which we can do something “valuable together.” Books satisfy your intellectual needs and are also a tool to help the underprivileged.

Donated books piled up in the corner of the Read Us Office

Read Us has received approximately 10,000 books as donations thus far and about 3,000 books remain now.

I think life is better when we are together. I believe that the most beautiful society is the place where second-class citizens enjoy their lives.

Q : What do you think is most important in your life?

Ahn I think life is much better when we are together. I believe that the most beautiful society is the place where second-class citizens enjoy their lives. Some children living in group homes were abandoned by their parents and some of them were raped. They don’t even know they got hurt. It breaks my heart when they show abnormal behavior resulting from their traumas. They didn’t do anything wrong. I don’t know why they should suffer from what they didn’t do. On New Year’s Day, they don’t receive any New Year’s gift of cash and cannot visit the homes of their relatives. On such a day, I buy some snacks and visit them. Volunteer work is actually difficult, but it becomes a driving force for us. I hope children without any dreams and kids who don’t know what they are living for grow up as normal adults and live happily in life. I think being normal is the most difficult thing. (laughter)

Honestly, I changed my mind after meeting Read Us Representative Ahn Yong-jae. As our society is too gloomy for the youth to have much hope, I thought I would mostly hear about difficulties and complaints. However they were so much better than I expected. They were planning projects with enthusiasm, making efforts to overcome the limitations independently to see their plans through, and preparing for the future with a positive attitude. The Youth. They were shining. On my way to home after meeting them, I was happy, felt light on my feet, and found myself humming. This is the original intention. I can cheer myself up when I’m with supportive friends. The best thing about Read Us is that they focus on helping neighbors and sharing with neighbors. They highly regard their own “values” instead of profits and practical interests. They were moving forward step by step without greed. Read Us tries to save a person’s thinking through used books. I fully support their work and hope their financial situation will get much better this year.

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