Jung Choe is proud of her garden, which she grows from seed, some donated by customers, some bought at Home Depot.
It’s an unlikely place for a vegetable garden: the six-feet-by-two-feet patch of ground outside Arlington Lee Cleaners. You can’t miss it if you drive by the Safeway at Harrison Shopping Center, because it’s almost like holiday decorations: large squash and cucumbers over a foot long dangling from vines attached to string. Tomatoes, pumpkins, flowers, and sunflowers. Jung Choe isn’t even quite sure what some of the vegetables are named. She plants the garden every year and gives the tomatoes or long cucumbers to customers who show an interest. Her husband helped her string up some support for the vines.
Jung’s Arlington Lee Cleaners is in the Harrison Shopping plaza area next to Chill Zone. Jung was well known during the pandemic for being one of the first to sew masks for people to protect themselves, and also to make up for the huge drop in dry cleaning customers. Her cleaners was recognized this year as one of the “Neighborhood Faves” by Nextdoor. Stop in to admire her garden and ask her about great Korean food in the area.
The mystery squash. Help us identify this!