Out of a
South Korean
Orphanage and Into the World

My adopting father told me he met my mother, and he negotiated with her.

Birth Year

1954

Adoption Year

1958

Adoptive Country

United States

A documentary
film project by
Glenn Morey and
Julie Morey

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  • Birth Year+
    • 1940s
    • 1950s
    • 1960s
    • 1970s
    • 1980s
    • 1990s
  • Gender+
    • Female
    • Male
  • Adoption Year+
    • Less Than 2
    • 2-6
    • More Than 6
  • Adoptive Country+
    • Australia
    • Denmark
    • France
    • Netherlands
    • Sweden
    • Switzerland
    • United States
  • Aged out of Orphanage+
    • Yes
    • No
  • Subject Matter+
    • Being Mixed Race
    • Have Contacted Biological Family
    • Being Mothers and Fathers
  • Clear Filterx
  • 7 countries
  • 6 languages
  • 16 cities
  • 100 stories

An international journey through the personal memories and experiences of abandonment, relinquishment, orphanages, aging out, and inter-country adoption from South Korea

 
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  • I didn’t have problems during childhood. I am who I am, Dutch Korean.

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  • My birth mother has remarried, and her husband can’t know that I exist.

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  • An immigrant family that was unwilling to give up on an abandoned orphan.

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  • There’s a different layer on life when someone chooses you.

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  • I learned how to pronounce my Korean name, and realized that it’s beautiful.

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  • She gave me a ring she was wearing and said, “We have the same hands.”

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  • I don't talk much about growing up in an orphanage—my darkest moment.

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  • Because I’ve chosen to become a single mother, I think about my birth mother a lot.

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  • I remember looking in the mirror, trying to see what made me a target.

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  • I’m grateful, truly, to be alive today. That’s why I tell my story.

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  • As of today, I do not know who is telling the truth, and who is not.

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  • A feeling of detachment, and an inability to connect with anybody.

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  • In the Holt records, it says that I was left on the doorstep of a man’s house.

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  • It was like opening Pandora’s Box, this piece of paper in my hands.

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  • Mixed-race kids were seen as human refuse, a scourge on their culture.

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  • My oldest son got me a DNA test, and it stated I’m 100% Japanese.

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  • What if I find out something I don't want to know? That scares me.

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  • It’s good to feel like you can acknowledge the complexities around adoption.

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  • I think that’s why God gave me my daughter, so I wouldn't be alone.

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  • It wasn't until college that I started to sort out my multiple identities.

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  • God, why am I here? Why did you put me in this household?

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  • My mother thinks that I’m happy all the time, not how I have struggled.

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  • My biological parents wanted us to be together with a Christian family.

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  • I did 23andMe. My second cousin on my birth father's side contacted me.

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  • I ask myself a lot of questions about my ability to be a mother.

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  • My adoptive parents loved me so much, before they even had me.

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  • I enjoy traveling. When you travel, you’re not supposed to belong.

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  • My adoptive parents are Korean. I found out I was adopted 3 years ago.

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  • My biological father is standing there, leaning over a motorcycle.

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  • I have chosen to see adoption as a part of my life, not the driver.

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  • I grew up feeling like a Martian who had arrived from outer space.

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  • Would I have been better off in Korea? I think the answer is always, no.

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  • If I were to be given another life, I would want to receive parental love.

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  • What I’ve learned through my faith in the Lord, is that it happened for a reason.

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  • We always felt we were Danish children, with Danish values and norms.

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  • I’ll embrace the sorrow I still feel, and one day I will heal and forgive.

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  • I was the baby—the first choice to give up for adoption. I understand that.

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  • For the first time, I saw other adoptees who looked a bit like me.

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  • I feel my friends hold the concept of finding birth parents closer than I do.

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  • I don’t know how to put it into words. I wish I could live like everyone else.

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  • Maybe even more as an adoptee, I’m afraid of losing my parents.

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  • I sold hard taffy, physical labor. Those jobs were my ticket to survival.

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  • There’s no information about me, my birth, my family in Korea. Nothing.

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  • I was 7 and a half when I was adopted. I was told that I had two sisters.

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  • I did a total 180 from not hanging out with Asians, making up for lost time.

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  • When I walk into a room, do people look at me and say, there’s the Asian girl?

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  • I meet facility alumni. Some are successful, some have gone astray.

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  • Adoption includes the first family. The child did not appear from nowhere.

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  • I am a man who should have died a long time ago, but I have a family now.

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  • In Korea, I can feel the way people look at me, and I lose confidence.

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  • My mother simply asked me, “Would you like to go to America?”

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  • Mild curiosity grew into a need to connect with adoptees and Korean-Americans.

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  • I was in the orphanage for the undesirable children. I was not adoptable.

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  • I never really discussed racism with my parents. I didn't want to relive it.

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  • That pain never goes away. I take my pain, and I put anger over it.

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  • After that, I kind of realized…okay, I’m a child born of rape.

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  • My facility experience has made me tough. I don’t cry over small things.

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  • We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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  • The email said, “We found your mother. You have to come to Korea now.”

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  • My mom told me herself that I was born on the floor at home.

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  • When I met my birth mom, it wasn't under the best circumstances.

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  • My earliest memories are of living in one room with my birth mother.

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  • Five Korean adoptees getting together, then 12, 15, 20, hundreds.

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  • What I had been looking for in my birth mom, I found when my son was born.

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  • I’ve been homeless 15 times, from 1987 to the present—5 years in NYC.

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  • I was born to have an identity complex, being adopted and transgendered.

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  • I see a lot of Chinese babies who are adopted. We kind of blazed a trail.

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  • I want to be as good a parent as my mom was for me. I’ll try my hardest.

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  • It made me embarrassed, that I had to explain my existence to other people.

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  • The woman on the phone says, “We think we found your mother.”

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  • My mom’s comment to me was, “You should be dating your own kind.”

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  • Yeah, I’m black and Korean. But first and foremost, I’m black.

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  • Korea never left me. Korea is inside of me. I eat, breathe, and live Korea.

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  • Our extended relatives made it clear. My sister and I were “add-ons.”

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  • People say my happy appearance is impressive, given my childhood.

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  • I’m most likely a foundling, left near a police station.

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  • I remember walking down a dirt road in Korea, and crying.

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  • My teacher told the class, “This is her last day. She’s going to America.”

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  • It’s important for me to share, to encourage others who’ve been victims.

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  • It took my birth father 35 years of searching. He finally found me 3 years ago.

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  • My adopting father told me he met my mother, and he negotiated with her.

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  • I didn’t get the answers I wished for, but I am more at peace with that.

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  • I have both my birth family and my adoptive family, and I love them both.

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  • He puts his little hand on my face. “Momma, we have the same eyes.”

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  • All of a sudden, I saw real Koreans, who weren’t speaking Danish.

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  • Learning Korean really made me the most in touch with being Korean.

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  • It’s not a job, but getting married that’s a challenge.

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  • I learned that I was incredibly lucky to have grown up in Denmark.

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  • I got married after my husband promised me he’d never mention my past.

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  • As a child, I often dreamt about what I saw the night I was abandoned.

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  • My husband and I are both Korean. Our son inherits our Korean heritage.

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  • I miss Korea and my birth family. It’s a sadness that I carry with me.

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  • I don’t remember much, except the crying—all those unhappy children.

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  • When I married, I hid my history. Afterwards, the truth became known.

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  • I remember, vividly, the morning my mother gave us up. She was crying.

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  • Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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  • If I wasn’t adopted, I’d be working a rice field. I’m not really an outdoor guy.

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  • My college essay was called “My Lucky Number”— my case number, K90821.

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  • My adoptive parents are Korean. I grew up speaking Korean.

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  • It was an unspeakable act. I wanted to forget it. But I couldn’t.

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