Dear Korea,

I’ve found myself angry at times living here because I think about the past. Even though I don’t really know much of it yet. There was no information really about me when I was born. My birth mother had me at a clinic in Gunsan. She was 30. There were 4 daughters before me and she wanted a son. At least that is what is says in my file from my adoption agency, Holt International.

I think because I lack so much information, it’s easier for me to create my own story. My own narrative about the situation. But sometimes that’s worse because anytime I discover new information, it can easily impact how my story goes.

When I learn about Korea’s rigid social hierarchy and the preference for males, especially back then, I can’t help but think how my life might have been different if I were a boy. And the lack of societal acceptance and government support for unwed women with children in those times, and even now, makes me wonder. But most of all I question how children could become a country’s biggest export so rapidly resulting in a generation of adoptees returning to their birth country seeking answers they may never find.

Was it for money? It would be hard to think otherwise. A lot of adoptees will never even try to come here. Not because they don’t want to but because coming back to Korea is much more complicated than one might realize. I still don’t understand why adoptee organizations or even adoptees don’t have more funding or more opportunities provided by the Korean government to experience their birth country or better yet, make a life in their birth country.

I’m blessed to have an amazing life of loved ones back home in America. Other adoptees may not be so lucky. If they knew that a life in Korea was possible, how might that shift their perception of building a life here, as well as their home country? How might that shape more opportunities for both Korea and other countries to work together? I can only hope that in the future more of this will happen and foster a new generation of international professionals that ultimately create a new level of globalization.