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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Why is Korea still sending children for adoption abroad?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

We have to stop turning ourselves into victims.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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