Sean Lee - Purist Group (Hard Parking Classics)

This is hard parking brought to you by Right Hunting and Right Toyota out of Scottsdale, AZ. I'm your host, Jay Fanning.

Coming up on today's show, we have a hard parking classic.

We're going to take a look back at episode 77.

That is over 220 episodes ago from 2021.

Sean Lee, philanthropist, founder of Purist Group in California. This is one of my favorite first

interviews because you really get to look inside.

You really need to take a look inside who Sean Lee is.

Of course, listeners of this podcast have come and gone over the years. So many of you may have never

even seen or heard this episode. It is available on video if

you're watching on Spotify or YouTube.

Otherwise, enjoy the audio. This is digitally remastered, as

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John Lee, welcome to the Hard Parking podcast.

Thank you for the invite, it's always great to be talking to an old friend, car enthusiast. Also we have the SIM card, you

know, the NS-6. This is right here.

NS-6 fam Oh yeah, I can see it. I can see it.

Yep, I can. I can see the front, the little

front light. Yep, I can see the front little

amber light. I've, I've wanted to get you on

here for a while and our, our schedules of course, are, are kind of walking all over the place.

You are an incredibly busy person.

People would argue that I'm busy, but I, I heard you on, you know, Sun King's garage and man, you just have an amazing origin story to tell. And while I will say that

everyone has a story to tell, your story is, I mean, it's all relative, but I, I just found your story to be a little special, you know, a little more unique.

And, you know, once people kind of get to know where you come from, then you know, it kind of helps them more understand, you know, how you are, you know what what's important to you and who you are as a person because you can read my entire history of my story, but it doesn't tell you who I am, right?

And it doesn't tell people who you, Sean Lee, are.

So, you know, just for the listeners, I've kind of talked about this for a while, but you know, tell us about your your beginnings, you know, you know, who is Sean Lee And, and you know, how did you get in front of me right now?

I immigrate into the States. Let's go back to my origins on

my family background probably will help people understand later on what I do, what I'm doing right now for charity.

So it sort of was five years old.

My parents divorced and my my at a time I was living in Taiwan.

I'm actually I was born in Taiwan and five years at age 5, my parents divorced and and my mom basically didn't want to have anything to do with me. And so she after the divorce,

she left Taiwan, came to the United States.

So my custody belong to my dad since 5:00 5-5 years old.

And my dad unfortunately was a very physical abusive kind of person. So he actually physically abused

me since from 5:00 to the age 14 and the age 14 and my father wants to 9 years and my father wants to remarry.

We're talking about physical abuse, not just like, hey, don't do this. You know, it's, it's a, you

know, I'm 50 years old. I now I recognize those are

really extreme abuse, you know, picking up your kids, tossing up against the wall, hit him with a pen, hit him with but you know, I don't want to go into that, but you know, abuse is abuse is done. I know I, I, I put a task behind

me already. So then at age 14, my father

wants to remarried again. So and he released my custody to

my mother. And that's how I came to the

United States when I came to the States.

And my mom at a time was unfortunate, was alcoholic and also a she's taking a lot of prescription drugs.

So if you know, those two things doesn't mix too well.

So she had heart disease and high blood pressures and she was taking a lot of pills every day. And she's also taking a lot of

alcohol every day. We're talking about I heard

physique. She's was kind of small frame.

She's taking minimum half bottles of cognac or Brandy or any type of drinks almost every day.

Excuse me. Yeah, that's quite a lot for for

such a, you know, small physique lady as she is.

So she's never physically abusive towards me.

But she told me but she carries a lot of baggage from her marriage between her and my father unto me.

So she was telling me that I don't want you since five.

It wasn't for your dad pays me a lot of money.

I would never want you to be with me anyway.

So I was feeling very depressed. So at age 17 I ran away from

home and gone on the street, become homeless.

I only have one T-shirt and pair of jeans and in the tennis shoes and stuff like that. Very small amount of it.

Just basically clothing, one backpack full of clothing.

I went into the street. I don't know where to win.

So I'm 50 years old. You push back 33 years ago.

We don't have cell phone, we don't have a car, We don't we don't have any. I have a bicycle.

We don't have anything like the kids that they have right now.

All I have is maybe a a few probably at the time I save about maybe a few $100 in my pocket.

That's all my belonging. And I was on the street, I was

sleeping in the park. I don't know what to do.

I don't have a job. So of course the first thing I

thought of it is I there's no phone, so you cannot find anybody and and your friends cannot find you anyway.

So after a few days, couple of my friends were like, let's say we're supposed to go play basketball, simply play tenants together. They found out that I've been

missing my scheduled playing time with them and then they started looking for me. They called on my house and my

mom told them that I ran off. So they started looking for me.

They found me in a local park and one guy took me back to his house. Still one of my best friend

today took back took me back to his house and I stayed there for a little while on the couch on in the garage.

Then I started, got to say, hey, I got to start looking for job.

So with a high school degree, it's hard to find a job.

So I started working McDonald door to door salesman.

I sell, I, I, I, I sell everything, you know, advertising on Yellow Pages. I, I, I, I've done door to door

to door to door salesman trying to, you know, hey, would you like to buy some pots and pans? And I did.

I did them all. There's a lot of people today

who have no idea what a Yellow Pages is.

And also Thomas guy, I mean, like in that day I was doing door to door salesman and and my the, the, the, the, the the manager at a time. Give me a Thomas guy and and

draw up like page 45 AP 45. That's AP 46 and those pages are

yours. Hit every single St. every house

is going knock on. That's how we that's how I did

it. You know, I'm so seriously, I

was selling pots and pans and knives.

So they give you 10 sets of pots, fences and knife sets and you knock on door to door and you just go there and sell it.

I did that for a short while and not, not, not for a really long time. So later on I started working

for a as a delivery boy in the shipping industry.

And, and then from there on I got myself involved in the shipping industries and cargo industry and worked my way up as a, from a delivery boy, a clerk to operation and become salesman. Then you know that that's

basically a short summary of all my life was, you know, throughout the. Sure.

Yeah. Doing all the door to door sales

because the doors don't knock as much as they used to, certainly.

But every once in a while people come by.

But you learn a lot about people.

Like how much do you think that you that kind of in a weird way maybe help prepare you for dealing with people because we'll get to it in a little bit. I mean, you're in situations

where you're dealing with people from where you used to be when you had no place to live to people who seem to have everything. And you're probably, they

probably all know you as Sean Lee.

You know how how much do you think that that helped you?

Yeah, I think that. I think the fortunate things is

I had that period of time. So I'm very grounded.

I love to deal with people. I'm not gonna say like, oh, my

net worth is how much right now. Therefore, I don't like to deal

with the regular people. I mean, I have always tried to

look for opportunity to able to help the people to thrive and to make them better themselves. And I'm glad that may I, I did

that to a lot of people. And right now they, a lot of

them say I inspire them. I write them, they write me

letters and, and, and to talk about their struggles making themselves become somebody. And some of them did become

somebody right? And, and, but throughout that

time, I remember when I was a door to door salesman and actually one of the job I found as most beneficial for me was McDonald. Believe it or not, I'm, I'm but

you got to know when I, when I came here at 14, I ran away.

I ran away home from home. I was 17.

I was still in ESL. My English and pronounce the

Asian was you know, and and and and and and I but for me, I have to go out and find a job that are going to force me to learn English and go out and learn to deal with people.

You know, I should remember the first door and knock, knock down or the first customer I I took when I was standing there at McDonald's. I was my hand was shaking.

I was like. Of course.

Yeah, he's afraid to messed up, you know, and and and it was those experiences made me like to deal with people today who I am today. And, you know, it's then you got

to know and at a time I have to go do it because I got, I, I have to feel myself right. But you know, minimum wage back

in the day was 325 or $3 something an hour, so 320 something an hour. So it's, it's, it's kind of

crazy that to survive on with that kind of money.

Have you ever going back and then we'll leave it.

I have a couple follow up questions and just for for like your information, I have no idea who my birth father was.

I was physically abused as a child and giving up for adoption. So you know, not quite as the

the same trajectory, but you know, from a, from having a whole, you know, in yourself for a long time.

I can kind of identify, you know, have you heard from him since at all or your mother? Like what's the what's their

their story? So both of them passed away

about maybe 10 years ago. I came to AI came towards the

end of my mom's life and I had a pretty darn good relationship with her. So I was trying to buy her house

and give it to her as a present because I understand as a woman that she was in a relationship with a very, very rough guy and she has no choice but to run away.

And regardless, I, I, she, she gave me my life.

I was in her warm for nine months and I guess there is love from her to me. I could feel that she just

doesn't know how to translate it.

How to love a love a kid because she never had a kid.

She had a kid and she left the environment because she's afraid of environment. And she came to United States

and got remarried, right. As for my dad, I was in custody

of my dad. And yeah, my dad never loved me

as a kid. And always hitting me, always,

you know, telling me how worthless I am and, and things like that and the, and the, and the.

So when I get older now, the more I get older, the harder for me to forgive my dad because I, I don't have kid right now.

I wish I have a kid, you know, I have a dog and you guys all know Bobo and he will see me go. I, I love my, sometimes it makes

me cry because I, I am the kind of person I love Bobo so much because, you know, like every morning I wake up to him and holding my arm like my own kid and kiss him and tell him that you're the best doggy ever, you know, treated him like my kid again, again. He's not a human being.

He, he, he is a, you know, I mean, he's the dog.

He's still a dog. I mean, for me as a human being,

I can have that much love for a animal.

I sometimes wonder why is my father don't have love for me at all. You know, it's like it, it, it

totally puzzles me. And that's why every year doing

father's days, it gets me very confused, right?

So and jealous at a time. So this year at 50 on my

Father's Day, I posted something on my IG and, and it helped me kind of to understand things a lot more and put the closure between me and my father and move forward, which I believe is very healthy for me mentally and and also physically and also in the future as well too, you know, so.

So yeah, I had a couple things. First off, with Bubble, I get

it. And I think it's it's for people

who don't have pets or that have them and don't adore them.

It's difficult for them to understand.

I'm the same way with Izzy, Mr. Waggles, everybody who, you

know, checks out my other page. I mean, it's, I look at him

every morning as I probably look at him 500 times a day when he's sleeping. And it's just like watching a

baby sleep. It's funny, you know, my family

makes fun of me. But I mean, Bobo's, Bobo's with

you, man, Bobo's by your side. And then, you know, with, with

Father's Day, I, I was going to ask you about that and you answered it. But you did mention that you had

like 3, the three mentors that kind of were basically your father figures. You talk to them.

Are they still around at all or do you still talk to them on Father's Day? Or is there ever been that time?

I was like, look, man, you're my, you know, thank you.

Thank you for doing this. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I do.

I I do talk to all my bosses because they, they did change my life. They I never had a father figure

in my life. And, and unfortunately, my first

boss that actually hired me into this particular field, he passed away a couple years ago, you know, right before he passed away. He he suffer a terminal illness

that needs a lot of money at a time.

So actually I bought one of his car, you know, actually I have a, a short video of of me and him eating our last sushi lunch together because he used to love sushi.

He's a he, he's a, you know, he's the first guy who hired me into I was like maybe 1819. So so I never thought it's going

to be our last video together, but but I know he's going back to Taiwan to get treatment for some of his illness.

At the time he wasn't that bad. It was like stage one, right?

So, so I go like, hey, his name is Nick.

I go Nick. I want to record his lunch that

we have. My first sushi is actually with

him, you know, and he's been my boss.

Usually he takes me out. I'm I'm basically I was

chauffeur because I was young, right?

So I was chauffeur him around. So everywhere he goes, I go and

he's pretty cool because when you go see customer, he has lunch. He usually had me sit in the

other table order me exactly the same thing.

So I was eating pretty darn good.

You know, whatever he eats, I have a you know, his first one would call me about ramen, sushi, sashimi, sake, you know, and you know, he you know, business side of thing.

He sent me back to school to to have me Polish up on my English scale. He said you got to run typing

because remember, 17 year old ran away.

I don't even know how to type yet.

You know, I didn't know English at a time.

So he sent me back into learning, relearn typing and pay for all my thing because it's almost too expensive.

Even though it back in the day was like, I think it's $15 a unit. It was really cheap for

Community College. Still like $15 a unit, but I'm

always making 3/25 an hour. You got to think about it.

So I, I, I'm trying to save as much money.

I, I can. That's why back in the day I

used to sleep in a minivan right in front of the office from Monday to Thursday or, or even Friday, you know, and I only instant renting the whole house. I only rented like a bed that

where I can sleep at night. I usually go there on the

weekend, you know, type of thing, you know, just trying to save money. I still remember I used to have

a jars of coins and and I was counting the coins to to survive. And also, you know, McDonald

back in the days, every like 18 or 21 minutes they draw away the burger perfectly. Burger they just throw away.

Oh yeah, for food, for food stuff, whatever.

Yeah, for health department. Yeah, but I usually put in a

separate trash bag and take it home and eat that for the next two or three days. So I love McDonald's food and

yeah. And yeah, some kind of smell of

it gets me. It gets on my nerves.

It's like I've been, I've been eating, I've been eating it for so long. But I still love their food,

trust me. And then sometime I still go

back and order a double cheeseburger.

That's one. That's one of my favor.

You know, I actually, I do that quite often.

I I eat a double cheeseburger probably at least twice or three times a month. Every time I eat it, the moment

you bite down, you go like, I remember that, that this, this, this was that moment I remember this, you know?

So. Yeah.

So, yeah, I still talk to them and they're they're they're my lights. They are.

They continue to mentor me on things I I get confused about.

And because they, you're older, they have a lot more wisdoms.

But just the conversation I can carry on with them right now.

It's much deeper now, in a different level.

Before, they're always like the. Yeah, so.

So it was them who taught me a lot of value.

I have, you know, in my ethics. You got to know I came from a

place that has no ethics. Nobody taught me anything.

And, you know, I could become a completely jerk.

I think I did before. So, you know, and now they put

me on the right track and sent me straight and, and, you know, do the right thing. I mean, to be fair to you, I

mean, some of that, a lot of that is built out of, I mean, anger and, and wanting to finally, you know, look, look at me like I'm here, you know, I, I belong here, you know, I just look at me, I belong here. I deserve this.

You know, I man, I tell you and like, and hearing that story, you know, especially about the McDonald's taking that bite of that burger and taking you back. Got to be honest with you, man,

it's a little emotional. Like I, I'm just telling you and

you know, I'm, I'm starting to get it even more because like I've known you casually and we see each other at events, you know, once in a while because I'm not there.

I'm in Arizona and you know, it's quick.

Hi, bye. You know, quick handshake,

quick, quick picture, you know, and then everything else from you is I'm just observing you online and on Instagram and on on Facebook and the purest Dr. winter drive, toy drive, you

know, backpacks, you know what, 3000 or 30,000, whatever it is, you know, you have truckloads of donation items and affecting thousands of people every time you do it.

And that's what I see of you. But I don't get that inside.

And that's why I'm having you on here today so that you can give people that that inside slice of you, because when you're standing next to the cars that the car meets, and I know you don't go to typical car meets that much because you want to be doing it, but people know you, they know your car and that's about it. They don't That's true.

Hear the McDonald's story. Yeah, that's true.

Yeah. People always think like

probably I can't find wealth and you know, just or I have a tree growing in my house shake the money comes out.

I mean, if you do, let me go ahead and send me some of those seeds and I'll plant them and see if I can grow me a money tree too. But you know, the reality is

people work hard for what they have, right?

So this is a funny joke about the tree.

So we had this conversation with with one of my friend we just met. He's really nice guy.

I was a car guy. So I was joking around and go I

have this tree in my garage and you shake it, money comes out.

But the the problem is you cannot shake it.

You have to have a every once a once a week, you're going to make a phone call to a little Green Man.

A little Green Man will come to your house.

You're going to tell them to come and shake the tree and then treat them. That money will fall.

Then you just pick up their money.

He goes, how do I get hold of Green Man?

Oh, you need a special cell phone.

And he goes like, OK, how do I get a cell phone?

But I said only I have it. But if you want to borrow it,

it's $1,000,000 there. You go.

He goes like, oh, that's how you Chinese make.

Money, I said. Yep, that's funny.

So, you know, I say buy the cell phone and give me the 1,000,000 bucks. They guarantee you get $25,000

back every week by shaking the tree.

I was just joking, but it was funny.

But like, but goes back to story.

I think I, I, I, I, I usually for a long time I kept my personal story away from the public.

I wasn't ready to release it. And and I think, yeah, I think

right now it's I I learned to face the inner demons and I think I owe a people in the purest community and car community to know a story as to why I doing so much charity.

And especially for your kids two or the kids, you know, and people was like, what's he doing?

It's been 10, curious. It's been around 10 years.

As you remember when we meet at the at the Sema, the one year I think you gave me your aunt 6 pin or, or stuff like yeah, that was awesome. Yeah, I always remember stuff

like this, you know, and and and it's it appears is never mine.

I never tried to create peers from mine.

So we, we never found, we never fundraised.

Every time we do events, money has to come up from somewhere and it's not enough money. I write a check, then the so in

the in when we give stuff, there's hundreds of volunteer, we have to feed them. Then when they send them out and

I, I went out by trucks and sprinters.

Sometimes you see me driving them.

It's just because so I can move those inventories easier around where to store them, where to store them.

It's a lot of work. As bigger we get a more work, we

involved and there's hundreds and hundreds Carisuthias and volunteers behind me that stand behind that logo and, and now that's touching. We never pay anybody.

We never pay advertising. People feel it.

They'll come in, they say, oh, I know what they're doing.

I love them. And you know, we, we, we endorse

them like because all what we did, we brought in Honda, Nissan and all this major brand supporting us without we ever approached them with a deck, say hello, we want sponsorship money. Whether no, we never done that.

We just was very organic. It was, it was pretty amazing to

see how you grow from the idea to blossom into this, you know, a pretty large organization now and eventually it's going to get bigger. Now we actually just did our

filing C3 filing. So again, I do it not because we

want to get fundraising from all around the world.

We do it because right now I'm 50 now I'm 50 something I I want to do it because in case one day I'm no longer here, there's still a lot of people in pure as like 10s of thousands of people around the world and, and they have to know the value why we started pure as 10 years ago. We would love to have them,

including you, of course, to help move forward.

It's for it's something very healthy, very genuine, one that built not just for the community, not just for the kids, It's also for your kids, for your kids future, because imagine your kids can interact with other purist members kid and and you know, most people that stays in purist, they're going to be pretty good guy. We vented out already, right.

So, you know, then it's, it's like a huge family.

It's huge family, you know, in, in the car world.

I'm, I'm not one person that I'm not really in the car world.

And yeah, I am. I don't sell, I don't sell

stuff. I don't sell wheel, I don't sell

tires. I don't sell nothing to the car

world. I'm this guy who enjoy my cars

and I don't consider collections.

And, and I, I, I, I drive on my car, I buy them as to how I'm going to drive them and track them.

So, so it, it's it it's pretty awesome to see all this car enthusiasts from different part of the world in it.

I see them on different forms. They oh, my car is more power.

My bill is better than you, better than that.

But when you go into pure, it's like when we post something that we need backpack, we need diapers, we need shampoo and, and for the homeless, we need toy drive, we need toys and people just start showing out 10s of thousands of people showing. And that's like when I know how

small I am and and wasn't for all of them.

You know, we like we all like small screws and we piece together and then we create this big, big machine.

And that's, you know, that's how purist me.

My purist, I mean, why did it? You know, I, I would imagine

it's because of your childhood, right?

Yes. For the listeners who don't

really know and haven't really pieced it together yet, you know, 'cause it's a big deal. And I think I'm, I'm on record

as, as telling you that for the one auto community that we have, which is, you know, we're all under cars.

We're all part of this one continuous circle, seeing the purist group and being a part of it.

But seeing the purist group from afar and all your guys events and then some of the events that I had back in Michigan, I'm like, man, we can do better, you know, and, and the hope is that people see that in, in wherever they're at Cincinnati, wherever else they're at saying we can do better.

So you've inspired us to do better and I think we've we've done pretty good. But that's where the some of the

inspiration comes on. Mayan like for you, you know,

why, Why purist? Like why 'cause you mean you

don't? You don't half ass it, Sean.

Like I said earlier man, you guys show up with with truckloads of stuff for people. Yeah, so we started.

My favorite event now is back to school backpack SO11 teacher.

She's actually impurist. I aired a story out a long time

ago, I think. I think it's on YouTube.

One of the guy produced on the YouTube.

She's a teacher at one of the school.

She had one student gets bullied because he carries a very, you know, crappy backpack with all duct tape and.

And so kids were laughing at him in school.

So she go, she calls me. I go, hey, Sean, do you have a

miniature of a backpack and some school supplies?

I go, yeah, but what you need it for?

So she told me the story. I go, how about this, go around

your school, ask every teacher to gotta be more than just one kids like this, right? So the getter at least about

maybe 35 kids. So there's the first year we get

her like 40 backpacks and bunch of toys.

We showed up at the school and just just pass them out and give it to his kids. And I couldn't believe it.

That was a pretty darn good school.

It's, it's in a good area or, you know, not like Beverly Hill, but, but it's, it's, it's not a bad area.

It's, it's, it's AB rated school, you know, and I can believe it's like 30-40 kids. They're, they're in poverty,

their families are in poverty. So I give that backpack to them

and I see them cry and they understand somebody cares about them. That was a very first incoming

experience, experiences with with them back to school, backpack drive. But you get to see those 30 kids

upfront, you know, and these are high school kids.

They get to talk to them one by one.

Right now we're just getting too big.

Let me tell you why, because we're getting about, we've been about 45,000 backpacks a year. So I can pass out backpacks, but

that's only just like 2 second things.

You know, they'll say thank you, but I don't get a chance to understand everybody's story. You know, it's kind of, it's

kind of sad for me because I, I love to know everybody's story.

But but, but it is what he did. So fun Dad 35 backpacks evolve

into today we're doing about four to 5000 backpacks and we still hand deliver all the backpacks to all the kids ourselves. You know, so, so that's like one

of my, I mean, I mean, toy drivers were big, right?

We we get 20 to 25,000 toys. You know, there's another story

about toy drive that we continue to do it rain or shine.

It's I'll tell you the reason for that.

But back to school backpack drive is I can give this backpack to the kids and not for show, but I know they were used it throughout the year and they can use to gain knowledge.

And hopefully I get to see that year after year, every year I give them new backpack. And so hopefully they'll

remember somebody's doing this for them and why they're doing it. And when they grow, when they

grow up, they they, they will pay back to their pay forward to. Yeah, yeah.

That, that the toy drive. Yeah, it is big, but it has

special meaning in my heart. So I mean, we rarely talk about

it, but talk about it today. I'm going to talk about it

because it's been a while, right.

So it's 10, it's 10. It's 10 year.

Next year will be our purest 10th year.

So our first toy drive pretty much first or second toy drive officially on their purest man or maybe the third one.

OK, that year, that's when when Paul showed up and that was when an accident happens. And and that's to make a long

story. Yeah, So what?

What? So to make a Long story short is

he died on this event by coming out to support it if we ever cancel this event, you know. So as a tribute to him every

year that's why Cody comes out and because of his path and me and Cody becomes such a close friend, I feel like doesn't put two and two together. And now they are right.

And that's why every year we do our toy drives, we always have a number of 40 sevens on the shoulder.

Paul's favorite number is 47. That's why you notice that my

tribute bill on my lining has 47 on there too.

And continually to, to do it in his memory.

But you know, we just never advertise.

Oh, it's, you know, it's related to Paul Walker.

We, we don't want to do that. So we never talk about this and

we always do little things like a 47 on the shoulder.

This is actually a volunteer shirt.

You can only get this T-shirt by volunteering.

So this is one of the most collectible items everybody.

It's pretty cool that I see people coming along with the.

Shoes you've had stickers, you can only get that stuff if you're there. Yeah, yeah, yeah, stickers we

don't sell. You have to be a charity event.

We give out for free and you have to continue to come to charity event to collect the special color.

The T-shirt is also free too, but you have to.

This is actually very cool when I build 400 every year.

So this is completely give it away to free, free to all the volunteers. And it's cool to see people

collecting it because they want to show people like when you go to car show, you see people wearing velvet.

Hey, I was there, you know, look, 2019, I was there.

You know, there's people like sometime they they will bring all the shirt to collect over the years and and and since day one, it's pretty awesome. It's pretty awesome.

There's a lot a lot of crazy story in purists that that I wish I I wish I have the time to start my own YouTube channels and podcasts. I'll get everyone of the

volunteer come up and tell the story on Why would you volunteer so much your time for Piers. Wait, what is so I mean, I mean,

there are people that there rain or shine every day, Just they're just there and and they're, they're one guy that has no money. And it makes me kind of sad

because he he's he's actually kind of ill, but he will sell his car parts and just every every time we have an event full drive backpack, he he will sell his car parts, take out.

He took apart his car. Just I said, don't do that to me

anymore. Don't, don't, don't, don't just

come and show up. And, and because it's crazy,

it's crazy and the, and the, and the, and all I can give him is, you know, some, some swag that created or some, you know, special stuff that people sign. I just give it to them.

But it, it, it's people like it's, it's, it's them that create this environment. You never thought people are

going to sell, take parts of the car to sell it, buy toys.

And he, he feel bad. One year ago, I couldn't donate

any more toys. This is all I can get.

I was like, dude, he come here on his Z, he's filled up with toys already. I go like, dude, stop it next

time. From now on, you're limited to

only donate 1 toys. That's it.

Don't, don't, don't bring me in. No, seriously, he's very ill.

He's to. Help him against himself

sometimes, you know. Yeah, yeah, but but I

understand. He feel good when he

participated. He comes here, you feel like

he's part of the family. I go, you're part of family.

You donate or not, you know, I know who you are, you know?

So his name is Louis. If you're listening.

Louis, you're the man. So there's another guy.

Dave Thompson. My God, he's the older man.

He he showed up at all events all the time packing up that packs, you know, you know, he's very he's keeping his own.

Sorry, David, if you're listening, but he he's he's looks older, but he's very healthy.

But he showed out every year moving the cargo, helping pack in the backpack, you know, 100° whether he's out there.

You know, hats off to you, man Dave Thompson.

There's quite a few people we can name, but it's just too long. Too long over less.

So Sean, you've, you've explained a lot of, of what purist does and you know, it matches up a lot of what I see online. There's a lot of you do you,

you're, you're very proud and accomplished and maybe still constantly searching a little bit because again, your beginnings, I mean, it's, that's a lifetime.

It, it could be to, to really, really, really pack it away.

And I think that you're doing the work that you were set out to do and changing thousands of lives of people who, I mean, honestly, the, the kid who grabs a backpack, you know, they, they could have a really screwed up home life, but that backpack can mean the world to them. And I think, you know, in, in

talking to these people. But when you, when we see you

online, sometimes it's, you know, your, your humble, you know, accurate. Thank you for this opportunity,

Hublot, Thank you for this opportunity.

You know, if you official sheriff, the department, you know, that's a it's an awesome opportunity.

It can come across, I think as at times humble braggish and you're obviously not that person.

I've watched your interviews. I've seen you get very

emotional. Shit, I was getting emotional

earlier when you were talking about biting into a freaking McDonald's, you know, cheeseburger, You know, I mean, do you get any backlash of, of people who don't really understand what the real story is?

Or do you just like, I mean, it's like the bigger you get in front of the more people you you are, the more it invites challenge and skepticism from people who don't really take 5 seconds to understand what's really going on?

I think I got pretty lucky so far, not that many.

I think you know, it's, it's less than 1% of people that have issue with me, right? Because again, like I never sell

anything. I never took money from anybody.

I never lied to anybody. And most of the time I do a just

stuff on my own. The stuff I have to think is

because there's a lot of supporter, there's a lot of brand that's supporting us and I have to go to their events and thank them in person to, you know, to, to, just to be there, you know, you know, you know, like Yokohama, Seatac, Michelin, these are, these are all our big partners in terms of a creating this community, you know, and, and, and I usually keep my private life very private and, and, you know, and, and I don't usually tell people what I have, what I drive.

And I think people knows that, you know, and real people knows what I have, but people see me posting like truck civics and it's something I like. It's something that's me, you

know, I, I take, I like to use my post and take people like this is Sean Lee when he's 16. When I was 16, I was reading

Crow and track in the library because I couldn't afford rolling track magazine And, and, and you remember, after high school, I go into the library looking for the newest rolling track car and driver and I learned about cars, this car and that car. So I, I like older cars, not

necessary to have to be, you know, 300 four, $100 million car. I like to take people back to

who Shawn Lee was back in the day and you're able to see like I enjoy to have crazy fast cars, but I also enjoy the down to earth, a 86 or Honda Civic and things like that, you know, so.

You're very grass roots in the cars that you have that you really, really enjoy. And of course, I'd imagine, you

know, being on the scene because I've come out there for a few just LA version events. I mean, there's everything

there, you know, from Bugatti's to whatever.

And you know, that's, do you have, do you have like a Tesla or anything like that or you just, you know, internal combustion? I mean, what are your thoughts

on kind of where the world has been going with EV and everything? I have AI mean believe it or

not, I'm consulting on a lot of EV company right now because a lot of them is owned by my friends and I guess you notice that from my posting. I just don't talk about we have

official affiliation with them yet.

So I for for for your electric car.

I do have a BMW I3 and also karma.

I just bought a Karma before they they they become karma.

It's called Fisker. So it's called Fisker Karma best

looking. So right now the car is being

purchased by a Chinese company. Now it's called Carma Rivero.

So a year and a half, three years ago when I first saw the car and I decided to buy one because simply because how they look. I enjoy the car a lot because a

lot of people has issue with the early Fisker because they're very limited on budget. Plus the the management at the

time was running down to the ground and and so the car has tons of problem. So far I drove about 26,000

miles. I used to have a daily and I

have 0 issue with the car except for like one or two moldings and and also the the winter seal has a little little wind noise that's about it. An car, like any car.

That could be that could be any car yeah and and and I enjoy that car a lot. So I I do have alternative

energy car like the EVI actually had quite a lot of EVI had EV since 2013. I had a Toyota Rav 4.

That's a Toyota building that Rav 4 with Tesla.

So my opinion is on it. There's no way we can avoid as a

car guy as the future of EV combination.

In the next 10-15 years your kids and your grandkids will be driving AEV only car because internal combustion chamber ICE engines. It's just simply cost too much

to research R&D and actually manufacture.

But think about right to get extra 30 horsepower out of our N 6 right by the change the Cam, the exhaust, the header and total body fuel injection system just to get the 3040 wheel horsepower out of it. But for EV, all they have to do

increase the battery pack size sizes and and and a lot more current goes into motor boom, you have your 30 horsepower instantaneously. So for longevity of the brand,

all they have to do is create a solid platform.

They can put a sports car body on top of it, a mini van body on top of it. Just use a computer to restrict

its output. And you have one single

production line, one single production models, a platform that able to fit every single category of the cars you know.

And on top of that, it's very fast, it's energy efficient compared to ICE, which is internal combustion engine and, and all this benefits. So for, for car developer,

unfortunately, we are the last. Maybe your, your next generation

will be the last two. It's looking on you.

So later on car Euthius, I, I always tell we, I mean, we have a lot of friends during the car world and they're, they're, they're famous critics of like automotive magazines.

We always talk about the future of car critics.

Are they going to be car critics or transportation critics?

Think about it like like like like I would love to own a Tesla right now because LA traffic is you know, it's horrible, but imagine I can I want to go. This is I want to go to Arizona

and see you as long as the range allow.

I would love to hop on a Tesla typing my destination and now just start driving. Then I don't have to focus on

brake. You know the painful part to

driving traffic gets people fatigued was.

You're putting your pedal gas brake gas, brake gas.

It take that that miserable part of your life on driving out of it. It does it for you.

So wouldn't wouldn't it be better that for daily commute you had you save your energy sipping on a coffee and just watching the traffic watch the sky.

Let the let a robot basically is a robot now and and the car does it for does it does it for you? You know, save your energy when

you arrive your destination. We can still be more relaxed and

have fun, right? Potentially a a passenger,

right? Yes, car critter or

transportation critter. Yeah, and cars like this is, I

told cars like this then we'll never make it anymore.

It's a car that actually gives the work, give you a workout, exercise for your for your heart and your soul, you know?

Yeah, but in the future, unfortunately there's no more car guys. So you will be just you don't

really have you got to find other alternative to work out your heart. And so, so like today say I want

to hear the engine growling, I want to feel like the weight on my steering wheel. I want to hear my tire tripping.

I want to I want to feel the understeer going to the wall and save it not going to happen anymore.

And the only way you can do it is getting to 1 of this right.

And no more cars in the future. All the cars going to be faster

than than this what we have right now.

But but it doesn't have no emotions or so anymore.

It it's it's a it's a perfect it's a perfect transportation now they're that's what they're working on right now.

They every every manufacturer is working on getting a deep perfect transportation, you know, and car without an engine, without you being there. Or maybe I'm old school for your

listener. I hope.

I hope nobody gets. Oh no.

Rangers on this one. Yeah, I think for cars it's you

got to have a a manual transmission, you got to have an engine you want to hear. I mean, for me, we're old

school. I got to hear the sound that's

like my coffee and that, that that will wake up my soul every morning. That will make me want to go

out, hop in the car and I'll drive 4500 miles and come back home. I'll have a smile.

I'll be very, very tired, but I'll have a smile.

That's that's what I think. You're very unfortunate then, 20

years later. I'm sorry.

Go ahead. They're very sorry to say 1020

years later there won't be cars. Yeah.

Well, thank you for that, Sean. We're going to move on to the

video portion of this, and I'll let the listeners know how to get a hold of you on the audio. OK, All right, let's keep rock

and rolling. What do you got there for us?

OK, it's pretty messy. I'm going to turn the camera

around now. I'm going to show you a couple.

I'll do it again. It's very messy.

OK, so I got to show you a couple cars.

Oh, man, this is a criminal. I'm putting all this junk's on

the car, but of course this is the N 6 that you know of.

It's on petrol issues. We talk about the ASCSA little

bit. So you have 1, so it's.

That's. This is a 919191.

Cool. Yeah, yeah.

So it's right now it's about oops.

Right now it's about maybe I think 70 some dollar miles on it. How much?

About 76,000. Miles 76 Wow, OK, not bad at

all. Yeah, and that's my 34 over

there. This part has my bikes are over

there, Ducati and the NBA Gustas over there.

So this is my this car is kind of unique.

This is actually pulse OO GT3RS that he sold to me and so Alfred, he sold to me and you know how we guys always talk about cars that we want to build a car certain ways.

And so we he wants to have the lightest Ras out there.

And so this is actually Lexant of the cup cars.

And if you notice the front fenders, it's actually a cup car front Fender. It's also in carbon to make the

car as light. Yeah.

Then I put it, I put in the Cara GT seats in there.

Those are nice. Yeah, just the Cara GT seats and

we tried to order a car as light as possible.

So Paul is a real car guys. So he so nothing on the steering

wheel, no chrono package and a menu seats and also a no, no NAV, no nothing in the middle. As simple as possible, as light

as possible. So we just want to create a the

lightest 97 Rs and this was the car, so yeah.

It looks pretty gutted without, I mean, while still having a an interior, you know? Yeah, this was.

Gutted. And will help me do the some

suspension tuning on it. So that's my OR35I.

Just squeeze over here. And say I've seen that on the

videos, like how are you going to get through that?

Yeah, I got it. I'm skinny.

So I need to go to McDonald's. I know those are my R35 that

I've been driving this a little less recently because you just have so many new projects that we're building right now just for fun. Oh, that's not good.

And you do? I think you'd mentioned you're

in the shipping shipping. Yeah, yeah.

Cargo business. Cargo, OK.

So we build this back in the day, this is roughly about maybe 600 on horsepower, and this is my Seal K63 Black Series.

How many cars do you have squeeze?

How big is that space? Because it looks pretty tight,

but it's probably tight because you have so much stuff.

Yeah, I have so much shit in here.

This is also an OE 46 that I got to take it out and take it out for a spin. I missed this car.

This car's so raw, so much fun. There's also one of a proposed

old car and it has JRZ. I don't know if you can kill

from here. No, just in suspension right

there. And they all, the one thing I'm

noticing about these vehicles and that could be like way off, but they're all uniquely different enough to give you a completely different driving experience.

Yeah, yeah, like, like this car, I drive a lot less now because it's so very, it's such a fast car.

This car actually destroyed my dream to own any more exotic cars because it is so fast to provide still somewhat a mechanical and analog grip on this car when you turn off the traction control, which has made a lot of fun.

So ever since I built this car, I, I, I found there's no need to buy any more cars, I think, which is kind of good.

You know, this was my very first Ducati.

I sold it to a friend and many many years later, oops, many years later, he actually gave me this bag as birthday present.

But The thing is, he never rode it so it's only two 2400 miles on it. Don't you announce?

That gold wing somewhere. Yeah, I, I gotta show you.

It's right over there. So this is a 99 AR that I

bought. I need to write this too.

So we're going to this card. This is the world's lowest

monitor RX7. It has only it it currently has

1800 miles. Holy.

Let's go back. Yeah, let's go back to the Gold

Wing. So this is the Gold Wing.

The goals are special. But if you know the story about

this was so Honda asked me to go on a commercial without telling me what commercial they want me to do.

And originally I thought just going to go there in the in the ride a bike and say a few words. But later on turn out it was a

surprise commercial that that in the end of the commercial, they told me like, Hey, we're actually from Honda corporate and also first publishing in Honda USA first publishing and rolling track magazine. So if you go search rolling

track magazines, they rolling track Shawn Lee go wing you able to pull this up. So at the end of the commercial,

they say, because Pierce has done so much work for the community and it we have a program called earn your wing.

It's like Angel earning your wing.

We like to give you a free going and that's how this bike came to be. And this is like, for me, this

means a lot for every single member in the purist because this is like a trophy. We all want this bike together.

It's not mine. You know, I mean, it's so hard

to have a major corporate give you some kind of recognition like this. And and this is it.

This is better than I would say any more cycles in here, you know, has more, more more sentimental value meaning.

Yeah. Because this is not just Sean

Lee's bike. This is 10,000 people, all your

effort going to pure yes, I yes, they give it to me, but but this is everybody's bike. So if I die one day, this will

be donated into pure as fire 1C and actually a lot of car here when I die, it's going to be donated into a pure fire 1C.

That's a Robert De Niro painting.

Yeah, that's a that's a painting I commissioned because Robert De Niro's good friend with my friends Nobu here, you guys the first one ever to see it because Nobu's not going to see it till Thursday. OK, so, so I'm bringing this

painting to Nobu on Thursday to to show him.

So yeah, Nobu's a good friend of mine.

That's awesome. Yeah, he'll, he'll see it like

we're seeing it right now. I see it, but he'll see it

before, before the rest of the the the parking crew.

So this is the lowest lowest mileage in the world.

Oh, except never restore. Everything's original paint.

Yeah. So it's the 10th anniversary

edition. It comes as a louver from

factory. I'm gonna go in there.

Just check out the interior. These are perfect.

Door panel. See, I'm gonna sit inside.

I'm gonna turn the lights. Hopefully you never get to a

point where you actually need money because you work so hard to get everything that you have and have such a good network.

But if so, I mean, bring a trailer, yeah. 18106 miles.

That's crazy. We're witnessing this.

So I drive this car, I try to pull 100 miles every year.

The reason why is to keep the engine.

It's a Rotary engine. You have to drive it.

So, so, so, so are we just going to keep it driving?

Like sometimes I go to advance, I take it out, I'll drive 2030 miles on it. Petrol ishes did the video on

this one. And so the donor media did the

video on this one when we found it was only 1200 miles.

So I bought this probably 8 years ago.

I just been driving it. So this is a 10th anniversary

RX7. That's amazing.

Yeah, St. up front still had a pop up headlight and this

headline headlight should be this one here, my headlight up.

Sean, thank you for for showing us your talking about your history and also, you know, showing us.

Oh no. In your collection.

It's honor. So this is 10th anniversary,

100% stock. So this card was found by Cody

one day you can ask him. This card belong to Cody

Walker's grandfather in law. So Cody went up to Oregon to

marry Felicia and he found this car in the barn and he, you know, he called me. I go, hey, Sean, what?

What the hell is this? I got like the RX7, but at the

time I didn't know the mileage. I go like, yeah, but you know,

it's my most likely has a blown engine.

So originally I had the CB headlight.

You see that? Wow.

Yeah, so I go like, yeah, you probably don't want to touch it.

So he like he actually had to managed to get a car started up and and and then from there on and then it still has the original engine. So he started up the car with

smoking. I go, oh, I probably need to

rebuild the engine, blah, blah, blah, blah.

He ended up So he goes, what should this be worth?

I told him the number. Then he sends me a mileage.

I go like, because at the time the car was very dirty and nasty. So I thought, oh man, the car

has an odometer to roll back. I mean, the guy, the guy rolled

back the odometer. And because remember this was in

a barn for a long time. So it's like, oh, does spider

with what kind of crap you can think of is on there.

And and I said, no, no, I was original.

I was like, it cannot be original.

I said, how about this, go take a photo of the of the, of the, of the, the go get the car washed up and cleaned up and send me a photo of the, the, the the underbody.

Then I'll determine if it's actually original, original or not. And he sends me the pictures and

was like, holy cow, if this is a 1200 mile car and and I go Cody, buy it, buy it, buy it. So originally he was going to

buy it, but the process was like, he goes like, you know what, I don't have a place to store.

I cannot take care of the car properly.

Say Sean, do you want it? I was like, hell yeah.

So I so I watched the bank and send me the payment and and that's how I end up with the car actually.

Not he, not he, not I didn't send me the payment.

I send to his father-in-law. And that's how I ended up have

the honor to have this car and, and, you know, and in my possession. So it's pretty cool.

Oh, I forgot, there's also A-991-GT3 up there too.

So Oh yeah, I was looking at it earlier, yeah.

Yeah, but that's just a regular 91-GT3 so.

Just another one of those. Yeah, most of my car I have

another storage. Most of my cars, some of the

cars you know stuff here is what I drive most and in and and and the other story will have other cars right like my 31 wagon 32 S 2000 super turbo. Of course, I just recently got a

300Z extreme cargo and I don't know what else here is The Cave.

This is what I I, I'll be driving this month.

All the cars here, yeah. The theme there is they're all,

and this is I'm not. This is going to sound a little

sacrilegious. They're all normal, fun,

enthusiast level vehicles. Yeah, they are.

Like what I was saying earlier, they're not.

You know, there's nothing wrong with Ferraris, Lamborghinis, any of that kind of stuff, but that's just not what stirs your soul. Yeah, I used to have them, but

I, I really can't afford them because their maintenance cost is way too high. Every time I drive them, I have

to tow them back. I go to track, I'm going to I'm

going to drive this car really hard today.

Two laps later, I have to tow the car back.

And all the cars here, you got to have one purpose today.

I can drive to the track, drive whole day and come back.

That's the bare mini amount that that that has to fulfill.

That's one of my requirements. So most of the cars I have here

right now, the brands are right now going back just purely JD and German cars because especially I collect, not collect. I have older cars now and I need

them to be easier to find parts. I need to ease them to be repair

and the turn around time has to be really quick.

So, you know, so that's why I started going back into my roots, JDM and and German cars. Sean, I got to I got to run.

I want to thank you so much for taking out this time.

It it's it was worth the wait and hopefully I'll see you in person again soon. Hey guys, I want to thank you

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Now it's stripping time. Ain't nobody got time for that.

Shut. Up.

Sean Lee - Purist Group (Hard Parking Classics)

About this episode

Honda Civic

BMW i3

Toyota Rav 4

Mazda Rx7

Kia Niro

Skoda Felicia

Honda S2000

Nissan 300Z

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