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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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