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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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