Throughout my childhood, I have always had a good understanding of money and its uses. In fact, back when I played little league baseball in elementary school, the fields had a small “snack shack” store that sold candies and your typical assortment of baseball snacks. For those of you who do not know what little league baseball is, it is an organized youth sports program that provides a system for youth baseball and softball players to play compete. After each game, I would receive a $1 voucher ticket that could be spent at the snack shack. While my friends blew their tickets on popcorn, candy, and fries, I would save each ticket on the inside brim of my hat. It was just natural.
As I grew up, my first small gig at the age of 12 was to chalk baseball fields as part of the little league “field crew.” I got paid a measly $6 dollars for each field I chalked, but it was a start to my own income. Of course, each dollar got saved into my mom’s bank account for me. I rarely spent a dime. As I got older and entered high school, I worked part time jobs as a teacher’s assistant at the local tutoring center and as a shift leader at a nearby frozen yogurt store. I continued to save money into my first joint checking account at Bank of America with my mother of during my sophomore year of high school. Saving money is a virtue that I adopted from my immigrant parents is deeply ingrained into me.
My mom, who has always been very passionate about investing, taught me the idea of using my money to make more money. Working part-time laborious jobs was tiring, and I did not save all my money for nothing! When I turned 18, I excitedly opened my first investment account, a Roth IRA, at Vanguard. This began my lifelong investing journey of managing my own money. I will document my experiences of short term and long term investing, and how I continue to learn about ways to manage money.
The Money Wey 