Thursday 21 March 2013

Who Named Kang Sun Lee?

Hello Readers. I received new words from Korea today. My social worker sent me the email of everything that was talking about. It's about my second mother (foster mother) and who really named me Lee, Kang Sun. Ultimately it's more bad news, it's another little hope I've been holding onto getting crushed. It's incredibly painful, but I'm trying really hard to accept it.

My second mother, Which is what I very lovingly and respectfully call my foster mother, received me on March 14th, 1991. She, my second father, and 10 year old second brother cared for me up until I left home to the states. They fostered through Children's Home from 1989 till 1995, during which they cared for 14 babies. There currently isn't a record of their location, or if they continued fostering through another agency. They are still very much lost to me, but we're not giving up.

There's been quite the debate as to who named me Lee, Kang Sun. Of coursed growing up it was assumed my birth mother did, then at 19 when I started digging in my American file showed my second mother had given me the "family name". We didn't know if that meant her family name or my mother's. Granted either way it was still Lee, but it was the being able to hunt for the document of who signed off my name that was important. It could help lead us to either my birth mother or foster mother.

When I finally started the search for my birth file my Korean agency confirmed my birth mother named me. Now searching deeper through my foster files we know the truth.

The faceless intake worker my birth mother surrendered me to named me, but they did give me my mother's last name Lee. To quote the file Korea sent over with this news, "In regards to the adoptee’s name, the intake worker used the last name of the birthmother. For the first name, Kang Sun, was made hoping that the child would become a peaceful/quiet and beautiful person."

It's good to know what my name meant to someone, especially it being who my mother had to surrender me too. I am very very touched by and thankful for their hopes for me. So thank you intake worker. Thank you so much for naming me with such beautiful intentions, and thank you for treating my mother's baby so sweetly when she had to loose her.

It's a bitter sweet feeling because while I am thankful for the intake worker caring so so much, I'm also very sad that means there's once less document to fallow to my mother and second mother. People keep calling all these pieces of bad news road blocks, but not to me. They're these little hopes being crushed one by one, but I still have other hopes. Like flicking out rocks of a Korean prayer tower, but it's still standing. my other prayers are still in place and holding up. I just need to hold on for more of this flicking.

As much as I wish I had a hand to squeeze right now while I cry in the middle of the student center of the lovely MCTC, I don't have that option, and it only makes me stronger. I'm growing up. If I accept all of this sadness as my reality and keep saving my other hopes as possibilities.. I can get through this. Stopping is not an option, I cannot forget all that I want to know and love.

I have to get through this.

Thursday 14 March 2013

A Trip Home!! :333

HELLO READERS!! I HOPE YOU'RE ALL DOING FANTASTICALLY SWELL BECAUSE I AM OVER THE MOON!! CAPS CAPS CAPS!!

This morning I got the email from my case worker that the 5 week language and culture program through Eastern Child Welfare Society has finally open applications!!! I have one medical thing to check off, my essay proofed by a few friends, and by the end of next week... My application will be sent off!

It's so crazy too think that in 3 months and 2 weeks, I COULD be home in Korea! This is amazing guys! It feels like something is really finally happening, a real planned to go to home. Not like last summer where it was all planned, but the groups had just filled up/closed before I could get in. And this isn't like those groups, it's not a vacation for adoptive families. This is a really mental health and heart trip strictly for adoptees.

Now there is the question of work. I will have a new General Manager soon, so I'm speaking with my current GM tomorrow about getting the time off, or find out if I will need to put in my two weeks, and then reapply. I need to explain that this is not a fun vacation kind of trip. This is for my mental health, so I don't slit my wrists or drive my car into a wall.

Home guys.. I could be home in just under 4 months. I've already priced out the airfare through Korean Air because I'm gonna do it up in style baby! I've also priced out home much I want to budget for new clothes, a new camera, fun spending things there, and possibly taking a day trip while I'm there. This is all so real it's hard to believe. Now I'm not counting my chickens before the hatch. I'm painfully aware they could end up not picking me, but I'm very hopeful and being mindful towards the possibilities of the trip.

Once my essay is all proofed and sitting pretty I'll post it. Until then, wish me luck :333

I'm 22, It's Not Our Fault, & Searching For Kang Sun.

Hello Readers. My birthday was full of relationship and sexual drama. I'm super annoyed of selfish people. I'm also annoyed of people who don't manage their liquor well. This is probably the best of all the bad birthdays, the bad being all of them. I think I'm pretty much over such American celebrations, next year will be a Korean dinner with who is nearest dearest to me. So I'll probably have dinner by myself because I always have to keep everyone at an arms length, no matter how badly I want them and need them. But on the bright side one of my friends was a real sweet heart and got me a birthday cake, colored me surprised. It's the best birthday tradition/gift anyone has given me.. Which also makes me really sad. But that's enough about birthdays because they suck. Let's dive into something fatefully serious.

***

In cases of child soldiers US rehabilitation states that the first thing they learn is that it is not their fault. That they were forced into the identity of a soldier, a killer, and that is not who they are. I feel like understanding identities of international/interracial adoptees should have the same first rule. It Is Not Our Fault.

We were forced as children into the identity of being white. We were made into Americans, something that is against our nature, and not who we are. We are constantly being told from the media, peers, parents, and sexual partners that lighter skin and wider/rounder eyes are what true beauty and power are. That blonde hair is The Best. We're told our whole lives that any sad or negative feelings we have are our fault. It's our fault we're not good enough to be loved and kept by our birth families. It's our fault we're not white. It's our fault we will always look different and exotic. Our handsome men are defined as feminine and therefore weak, Our beautiful woman are deemed as second class citizens and "wonton" whores, and ultimately we're ALL labeled as un-American.

We're told that the one good thing we've done is made families for our adoptive parents, but it's still our fault that we aren't their biological children. It's our fault that the product they bought didn't actually come with a guarantee of "the real deal" of a biological child. Our identities are our problem, our fault, and we are to blame for everything. Shouldn't the first thing we hear is that none of this is our fault? That we were just babies who got crammed into a mold of the American ideal, a mold that we're not made fit. We'd NEVER expect our adoptive families to cram into the mold of our appa or umma. We'd never force them into Korean food, Korean culture, and we'd never think it ideal for them to learn Korean. Why are we not raised to accept ourselves, to love our genetics, and to be proud of our birth countries.

Tell me America, what is so goddamn wrong with being yellow? What is so bad about not having white skin? Why are we loved so much less because we can never really replace the biological children our parents couldn't have? Why do you blame us for not fitting these identities that aren't even ours?

This is all pouring out of me because I was watching a Bones episode **Spoiler Alert*** on child soldiers. I get so angry and upset when I see and hear about a group of people being ripped from their identities and their normal culture, for the purpose of pleasing others, who force them into a new mold. It just makes me want to scream for them that NOTHING is their fault! That they are loved, and seen, and known in this world. And that I will do anything to help them understand that. I will do anything to help an adoptee find their way back to who we were born as, who we never got the chance to be raised as.

"The Search of Kang Sun Lee" doesn't actually directly refer to my birth search, it's searching for me. It means searching for that little baby who had her whole world, her culture, her tongue, and her identity taken away from her. I'd do anything to get Kang Sun back. In Korean Kang Sun means "Calm, Beautiful". I hope "Calm" means I laid lovingly still in my mother's arms. I hope "Beautiful" means she was happy to see my face and know her first child, her first baby girl. Whoever that little baby she was holding was, she was murdered when she came to America, and I hope I find her and know her one day. I hope to find Kang Sun, my identity.


어머니 난 그냥 당신 집에 가고 싶어. 나는 내가 정말 마음 깊은 곳이다 누구를하기로되어 있었는데 누구인지 알고 싶습니다. 나는 내가 태어 났을 때 당신이 만난 강 태양을 만나고 싶어. 나 역시 당신의 충족도 못해,하지만 태양이 별을 그리워하고 달이 태양의 따뜻함을 그리워보다 당신을 더보고 싶어. 널 무척 모두 내 전부이고, 난 그냥 당신을 다시 갖고 싶어. 난 당신을 사랑스러운 사랑 해요.

"Mother I just want to come home to you. I want to know who I was supposed to be, Who I really am deep down inside. I want to meet the Kang Sun you met when I was born. I never got to meet either of you, but I miss you more than the sun misses the stars and the moon misses the sun's warmth. You both are my everything, and I just want you back. I love you dearly."