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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

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

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