[KS] Adoptees have authentic sorrow

[Henny Savenije]

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(From the newsletter of  an electronic weekly newsletter published by the 
Society of Korean-American Scholars (SKAS).  Recent issues are posted in 
SKAS page (http://www.skas.org).

Subject: Adoptees have authentic sorrow

Critique of the critique
     Letters to the Editor (to the Korea Herald)
     Adoptees have authentic sorrow
     By Lee Kareen Soon-hi, Seoul
     http://www.koreaherald.co.kr/news/2000/09/__03/20000918_0314.htm

     I have a very similar background to that of Elizabeth Kim, the author 
of "Ten Thousand Sorrows: The Extraordinary Journey of a Korean War 
Orphan." I do not see why Brian Myers finds her story improbable ("'Memoir' 
defames Korean culture," Sept. 7). I grew up as a mixed race child in Korea 
until the age of 13 and was put up for adoption due to the illness of my 
birthmother. Unlike Kim, I was usually able to pass for Korean and had a 
normal and supportive environment that included both social and academic 
success and  acceptance.

     Had I grown up in Korea under the care of my birthmother and had I not 
come to the United States and read Kim's book, I might have felt the same 
skepticism toward her story that Myers does. After all, the story is 
certainly a sensational one.

     Before coming to the United States, I lived in an orphanage run by an 
American priest. He took in both full-blooded Korean children and mixed 
race children to find new homes for them in America. Most of the children, 
however, were sent there because their parent, usually a single mother, 
could no longer endure the excruciating poverty and social stigma that came 
with having children whose foreign fathers had abandoned them.

     Regardless of their situation, most mothers gave their children up out 
of love. This is something only the adoptees can understand. Although my 
mother wasn't murdered as Kim's mother was, she was ostracized. Except for 
one member of her family, her entire  community shunned her completely. She 
was then abandoned by my biological father and had to struggle with her 
three children as best as she could. Despite poverty, she held out as long 
as she could. When the breaking point came, she had no choice but to 
giveher children up for adoption.

     During my stay at the orphanage, I saw how cruel and hateful people 
could be towards helpless and unfortunate children. It is a world that no 
one can possibly understand unless he himself has lived through it. Inside 
the orphanage, there were many cases of sexual, physical and emotional 
abuses that the administration may or may not have known about.

     I don't know where Myers got his idea concerning the words "honhyul" 
and "tuigi," but they both mean the same thing. We heard them both 
constantly. The word honhyul simply means mixed-blood. Just because 
educated Koreans use it doesn't make the way they spit it out at helpless 
children any less hurtful.

     There is no refinement attached to that word, believe me. Please spare 
me from your pseudo-Korean linguistic knowledge because I am fluent myself 
and I fail to see the distinction you are making.

     Furthermore, I do not see what is so improbable about Kim's 
description of the Korean countryside in the early 1950s. Have you and I 
lived in the same country? As a child growing up in Korea in the 1970s, I 
saw people and places fitting Kim's descriptions. Moreover, Kim left Korea 
around age 5 or 6 and it has been over 40 years since she has left the country.

     The scenes that she refers to were taken from the memory of a 
5-year-old child and you have to take that into consideration. I know of a 
Korean woman who was shamed into hanging herself after giving birth to an 
Amerasian baby. Of course, reading this story doesn't paint a positive 
picture of Korean culture. But one must not be so defensive as to take the 
story as an affront to all aspects of Korean culture.

     Elizabeth Kim never claimed to be the cultural attache of Korea and 
her story is certainly not representative of the experiences and the 
viewpoints of the majority of Koreans. If stories like Kim's and mine make 
you uncomfortable, then I have to say that you are a fortunate person for 
not having lived the kind of lives that we have. No one should. But that 
does not give you the right to deny the authenticity of our stories.

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Henny (Lee Hae Kang)
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Feel free to discover Korea with Hendrick Hamel (1653-1666)
http://www.henny-savenije.demon.nl (in English)
In Korean
http://www.henny-savenije.demon.nl/indexk2.htm
In Dutch
http://www.henny-savenije.demon.nl/Dutch
Frits Vos Article about Witsen and Eibokken and his first Korean-Dutch 
dictionary
http://www.henny-savenije.demon.nl/FritsVos
Korea through Western Cartographic eyes
http://www.crosswinds.net/~hennysavenije/ (in English)
Hwasong the fortress in Suwon
http://www.geocities.com/hennysavenije