I was born in Andong, South Korea in the mid-1990s. Although I don't recall the exact year, I believe I was around 9 years old when our family relocated to Southern California. At that time, my knowledge of English was limited to just one word: hello. So, I spent the majority of my time with my only friend, Diablo II. I think it's fair to say that I was a game addict.

One day, my sister called me over and showed me a program she had made in C. It displayed a prompt, Enter your name. I typed in my name, and it responded with, Jii is an idiot. This unexpected encounter served as my first exposure to programming. I found programming incredibly intriguing, far more captivating than any games I had played before. I self taught programming and as I spent more time with it, I gradually lost interest in playing games.

After high school, I enrolled in a community college to study Computer Science. Then I transferred to UCSD pursuing Math-CS. However, my passion for understanding user experiences and interfaces led me to switch my major to Human-Computer-Interaction. As my fascination with web development grew, I began creating personal blogs as a way to practice and refine my skills. Following my graduation from UCSD, I moved to Japan and got my first professional work experience as a front-end developer at a healthcare startup.

After spending three years abroad, I returned to the States. Currently, I reside in Kentucky with my partner and our beloved German Shepherd puppy.

That's about who I am. If there's something you want to know more about me or are interested in discussing potential remote opportunities, please don't hesitate to reach out to me via email at rolemadelen@tuta.io.