Making a U-turn

Jeremy Chumfong hardly seemed to fit the profile of a "troubled youth" as he sat quietly at the back of the classroom.

"I got into a lot of trouble on the east coast and decided to come west to start over" Jeremy said quietly when I asked where he was born and what brought him to Oregon.

He arrived as an 18-year-old youth and has been here for four years, attending OSU and LBCC. A political science major, he currently has about two terms left before graduation.

Jeremy plans to become a security officer and follow in the footsteps of his parents, Zack and Carol Chumfong, who are US Embassy employees.

"My father works for USAID ( the US government's Agency for International Development) and is currently serving in Africa," Jeremy told me. "My mother always goes wherever my father goes and does random jobs for the embassy."

Unlike a lot of young men his age, Jeremy is not a couch potato.

"I hate sitting around the house; I hate TV."

When I asked him about things he does enjoy, Jeremy revealed that he is "really into firearms. Most people don't think it (shooting firearms) is relaxing, but it really relaxes me."

He likes to get out, especially to places like Marys Peak.

Jeremy was born in New York City, on what he calls "the little isle of Manhattan", to international students who met while attending NYU. His father is a native of Cameroon; his mother is a native of Jamaica.

While he may be an unlikely candidate for the title "troubled" today, Jeremy is as an example of how a young man can change when he realizes he has made mistakes and decides to "hang a U" on life's road.