On May 24, 1985 at 1 pm (or 2 pm, depending which parent you ask) after a tumultuous pregnancy and extraordinarily long labor, Camille Alexandra Tsoi was born. It was a story she was repeatedly told and each party made a point to announce that she was an astounding 9 pounds and 3 weeks late. Her maternal grandmother, Mae would later claim that her parents should have seen the signs of Camille being their rowdiest child from the start. After all she was born in the year of the year Tiger. She would be wildly competitive, unpredictable, and self-confident, but impetuous and overindulged. Her grandmother had no doubt that her granddaughter would live up to her sign.
It was all about signs for the Tsoi family. For example, Peter Tsoi met Joyce Wu during college orientation in August at 8:00 pm. Their birthdays were both respectively on September 8th and March 8th. They got married 8 months later in a large Korean ceremony much to their parent's delight. While it was a short courtship, the traditional couple knew from the start they would hold off on having children. They both concentrated on their respective career, Peter as engineering professor at his alma matter and Joyce as a nurse.
Camille had been a willful child from the very beginning. Her dark locks of hair and olive skin made her indistinguishable from her sisters, but their personalities could not be anymore different. Focused on being the center of attention meant that Camille went out of her way to make herself be seen. She'd often put on fashion shows for her family and encouraged (read:forced) them to listen to her play piano or try some concoction of a meal she had tried to cook in her easybake oven. She was eager to be seen and noticed, because being the middle child of three only made her feel like the Jan Brady of the clan. For one, her older sister, Margot, was natural at academics. Chess and MIT math skills? Margot had that covered. Her younger sister, Vivan, seemed to lack any of the clumsines that plagued Cam. She was an expert swimmer and track star.
Being the middle child though had its perks though especially when it came to getting away with things. Camille learned quickly she was able to push the boundaries much more than her sisters. She was fearless but careless all at the same time. It wasn't the most admirable trait her grandmother Mae would argue. Growing up in tradtional home but with her sisters, caused Cam to always feel differennt. She celebrated the Lunar New Year and get dressed up for the Easter bunny. Her mother would cook kimichi for Christmas, while her sisters and her would bake ham for the rest of the family. It was never being one thing and that was something that Camille still carried to this day. She didn't like labels and that became even more apparent as she grew older.
If being social queen had been a class, it would have been one Cam would have aced. She was heavily involved in extracurricular activities from the school newspaper to student council. It was in high school that Camille noticed her knack for writing. The words flowed out of her and that was even more true when she wrote about her favorite topic, fashion.There was very little doubt that Camille was a fashion savvy teenager. Always looking ahead of trends, she would create her own looks. In fact, for her 16th birthday her parents gave her a sewing machine which allowed her to create her own designs and actually wear them. Her love for fashion would nudge her to consider a career as a fashion writer.
After being admitted to New York University as a Journalism major, Cam indulged in the freedom she felt being away from home for the first time. She no longer had to maintain curfews or hide boyfriends from her parents. It was during her 2nd year at NYU that she began to intern for small fashion houses, learning the trade. It wasn't terribly glamorious to bring coffee or spend her summers in hot and muggy offices, but she learned the politics of the fashion industryand how important it was to make contacts. By the time she graduated NYU, Camille had started her own fashion blog and started to send her writing samples to various magazines. At first, she got little traction and spent the first two years being a frace lance writer and focusing on her blog. Her parents contiously questioned her choice to be a writer even worse a fashion one, but decided to let their daughter sort it out. She was still the hardest one to raise and even as an adult even more stubborn.
Finally after two long years, Camille was able to get the break she was waiting for at Elle magazine. She started as fashion contributor and then became a full time writer for their on-line site. She still maintains her blog but is toying with the idea of expanding it further.