Made in Korea
Amanda Berg, staff writer
March 14, 2007

My family is the ideal nuclear family: a mother, a father and two children. They're loving, supportive, intelligent, open-minded, hard-working people.

They also happen to be white.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are approximately 48,000 Korean-born adopted children under 18 living in the United States. Nearly one-fourth of foreign-born adopted children are from Korea and nearly half of such children of all ages are from Asia.

Despite these impressive numbers, the stigma of being in a biracial family remains. Among my peers and colleagues who are also adopted, a feeling of isolation and alienation often arises. Not only are we separated from our birth families, we are more often than not separated from our culture and heritage.

Without the benefit of being immersed in Korean tradition from birth, I have little understanding of my roots. The only Korean words I’ve learned are slang and profanity, and therefore not helpful in any practical way. I know very little about Korean history, and because of my lack of education in Korean customs, I seem to offend most any traditional Korean person that I encounter.

Interestingly, this fact never posed a problem for me until I was confronted with the wide-eyed disbelief of others that an Asian American could have Caucasian parents. My lack of education has evidently created a deficit of character for me. So to correct this, my parents did what many other adoptive parents are doing; they encouraged me to find ways of reconnecting with my heritage. This included befriending the other Asian kids in school, reading books on the history of Korea, and a sort of Asian Big Brother/Sister Program in town. Despite all these efforts, I adamantly refused to accept Korean culture into my life. In fact, when questioned or ridiculed for “not being Asian enough,” I would distance myself even further from it.

To outsiders when I am seen with my family, I am ever the foreign-exchange student or, even worse, my brother's girlfriend. I've been asked if I miss my real parents or if I plan on going home. I don't identify completely with either the white or Asian community, and there's only so much my family can understand.

As the numbers indicate, I'm clearly not unique in my situation. And with the population of adopted Asian Americans rapidly increasing, perhaps soon I can feel alone with many others.

Amanda Berg is a staff writer for AsiaXpress.com. Amanda can be reached at Amanda.Berg@asiaxpress.com.