That's what I am.

My parents grew up in small towns in Minnesota. My dad came from a more traditional old fashioned family where everyone had a farm or knew someone with one. My mom's family was a little less country life but still your average hard working people living in an average sized town. They met when my mom was 14 and my dad was 17 or 18 (I forget). They got married after my dad joined the Army.... and a few years later they found out they couldn't have kids soooo they adopted lil ol me from a Korean orphanage at 4months old. Of course, as life would have it, they ended up having 2 sons later in life, my brothers Jason and Adam. So I am a Korean that was raised by a white American family. I was abandoned by my birth mother, and only once did I was feel sad about it. It was when I was in the active duty Army.... I was bored at work one day...so I looked online for the adoption agency that my parents used and contacted them by email. They wrote me and told me they had no information but they did have pictures of me prior to my adoption. When I received them in the mail, I just stared at the pictures like...is this really me? It seemed so weird...so foreign. I cried that day and that was the first and only time I was ever that bothered by the fact that someone really just left my ass somewhere and didn't look back. My mom thinks that my birth mother was probably really young and alone. I suppose so. I do sometimes wonder what her and my birth father look like...but then I assume (probably ignorantly) that they probably look like me and every other Korean I see around...lol

As a child, my parents tried to get a few Korean women to teach me the language and culture, but it was never interesting to me. I don't know why. I've always been so indifferent to my culture. I've never even had an Asian friend in my life...not because I didn't want to...I guess it just never happened. I actually resented being Korean growing up because it made me different from everyone else. There used to be people at church that wouldn't want their sons to sit with me, believe it or not. When I was a kid, I used to pray for eyes just like everyone else and even wished I was blond and blue-eyed a number of times! I had my share of bullies of course...heard all the chinky jokes... My parents also took me to a Korean concert one time...ugh...I cried and they finally relented and took me home (the singing was awful). I disliked eating oriental food until I was a teenager. My mom and dad still to this day tell stories about my rejecting everything Asian. Apparently when I was about 4 or 5 years old I told them if they ever sent me back to Korea, they need to pack me a McDonald's lunch! After awhile they pretty much gave up on the idea and I don't blame them. There is no parenting book that could help them make their Korean daughter more Korean.

No matter where I've been in my life, there has always been some random Korean women coming up to me and asking me these two main questions... "You Korean???" and "You don't speak-y??" Most of the women have been pretty friendly (almost scarily friendly)...and a small handful have been a little hostile when they find out I'm not quite like them. I'm so paranoid...when I go anywhere and there is a group of them, I automatically feel like they are looking at me like, "She's one of us!" Instinctively, I always want to yell, "No I'm not, I'm nothing like you!" For some reason, it embarrasses me for anyone to think I'm down with my culture. When I'm at clubs or out on the town, I hear things like "pork fried rice" and "hurry up and buy!" and etc etc.... And although I know these comments only come from ignorant folk, I still cringe inside... Because I want to say, "I'm not Korean, you moron..." What I've figured out is that I know how people have already discriminated against me because of my race...so I think it makes me try even harder to present myself as the furthest thing from Asian as humanly possible. It sounds stupid as hell.....I know. It's like some weird complex or something.

Now, however, I'm a mom...........and I don't want my kids to see these things. I want them to embrace all three of their cultures (American, Ugandan, Korean) and not be so small minded like their mother......I wish that I'd learned enough to pass down some of my culture to my kids... The best thing I can do at this point is to become more interested and encourage them to learn as much about Korean culture as they can. With all this Ugandan culture that they'll have, I feel bad now that I have nothing to give besides my regular good ol American traditions.

I have never looked at myself as white, black, yellow, or any particular color. I see myself as Leah. That's it. I hate having to fit into some category. But thinking about all this does make me realize maybe I should have done some things differently in my past.... I still appreciate the beauty and uniqueness of all people no matter their background.

I re-read this blog and kinda felt stupid.... But it is just me being honest about my feelings...and actually feels good to let some of this stuff out and be brutally honest with myself. After all, none of us are perfect. And I'm farrr from it. But tryin to improve upon imperfections has got to only lead to great and wonderful things, right?