Former State Assemblywoman from Florida
It has been a real experience this weekend, getting to know you and some of the other adult adoptees. I know by now that you have all shared and heard stories about everybody’s experiences in adoption. I have been trying to think all weekend what can I talk about that’s different and that people want to hear about at this point. I am just going to tell you about me. My own case is a little different because I was actually born and raised in Missouri in the 50"s, as you have already been told. I have done a lot of things in my life and when people ask me today, "gosh what have you been doing," I always say that I am in the seventh of nine lives. But as I was sitting down this morning trying to count them out, I am actually in my eighth, which is a little scary.
My first live was all my childhood. My second life was my marriage to a German Irish Caucasian typical male macho arrogant ..man. (laughter) Excuse me I get off on these little tangents once in awhile. My third life was a marriage to a Japanese man – no not a Japanese American man, a Japanese man. My fourth life was post divorce, so I went from house to marriage to marriage and was then on my own. My fifth life was in law school which was an experience of its own. My sixth life was in politics as a state legislator in the state of Florida. My seventh life was post politics in practicing my legal profession, which was what I went to school to do. Then my eighth live, which I am currently in is that in business as a CEO of the National Safety Council. So, let me just share with you some things that I experienced as an Asian or Korean adoptee during a few of those different periods.
Some of the memories I have as a child I can remember very distinctly and I was with this family since I was 2 months. Basically I have been with them my entire life. I can remember being introduced as the adopted daughter. The adopted daughter, this is our new adopted daughter. And I don’t know why that stuck with me, it still does and I can remember it other than that was what clued me in to the fact that there was something different about me. This was neither here nor there it was just that I was introduced as the adopted daughter and I didn’t remember my siblings being introduced as the adopted sons – maybe they were. I had a very typical upbringing raised on a little farm in Missouri until we moved to the big city of St. Joseph, which was about 80,000 people. There weren’t too many others like me. I can remember one maybe two during my childhood that looked like me. I didn’t have access to or know of or I don’t think even existed the kinds of organizations and resources that are here today. So, I typically I grew up on potatoes and meat and we had a farm and chickens and I went to Bible School and those typical things. When somebody asks me what it was like growing up, well I guess it was probably kind of like how you grew up. Although once in a while something would happen that would remind me that I was different like I walked in the shopping mall and someone would say, "Oh look at that little Chinese girl." It was like I’m not Chinese, I mean I may be eight years old, but I know I’m not Chinese. I didn’t understand what the big deal was about. Little things like that would happen, but my parents always made an effort to make sure that I understood that I was adopted and I knew that term very well, not really understanding it, only knowing that my adoptive mother was not my "real" mother. And so when I was about 8 or 10, they brought out a box of Korean items that had been left for me – a fan and some chopsticks and some cloth – things that really didn’t have a lot of meaning for me other than they were pretty and now what do I do with them. And then I would have occasional trips to visit the social worker who was involved with my adoption and low and behold I had this other name that I couldn’t pronounce that had no meaning for me. "Now what do with this?" So, there were some little things through out my life that would remind me that I was adopted and that I was different. Were it not for the fact that I really didn’t get along with my mother too well, I probably wouldn’t have been as interested in finding my other mother at such a young age. We had our problems probably from the time I was 12 or 13. Up until then I had been the very good little "do what your told" kid, I’ve been told. Something happened when I turned about 12 though. In junior high school we started having a lot of problems. We fought all the time. I think that is really what must have spurred my need to find my birth mother. I can remember my mother would buy the Enquirer and I opened it up one day and there was this article. Remember this was early 60’s and their was an article about some organization that would help adoptees find their birth parents. This was a Korean organization. So, I took the Enquirer and I hid it. I came home from school one day and it was gone. It was just gone and I cried my eyes out. Whether my mother knew why I had saved it or not, I don’t know. But, I have to assume that she did and I blamed her quite a bit for throwing that away. I never once said anything to her, cause I was a little too embarrassed I guess to talk about how I felt with her because we just weren’t close. We weren’t a touch feeley kind of family. I got over it, but it is one experience that I will never forget. And I told some of my friends here today that I didn’t know how I was going to get through this speech. (tears)
Well let me transit to my second life, to get, me out of the tears. This is the one where I was married to the German, 6 foot two eyes of blue, blonde haired typical all American male chauvinist. (laughter) It didn’t last.
My third life is the one that I term my being born again Oriental. Actually this was my transition from my white husband to my Japanese husband. Up to that point remember that I grew in a very isolated typical mid-western kind of world where there wasn’t contact with other Asians. I didn’t know that I was Korean or Oriental or whatever that was. So, I moved from Missouri to Florida and went to work in a department store selling cosmetics in Tampa Florida where there happened to be a lot of Koreans, but I didn’t know that. They would come by the counter and they would stop and they would ask me, "oh where are you from and what’s your nationality/" And I am just wondering why are they asking me these questions. I didn’t want to talk about it and I didn’t have time and I was just a little annoyed because white people didn’t stop by and ask me those questions, it was only other people who kind of looked like me.
Well to make a long story short, I ended up going to work part time right before I got divorced. I went to work at Beni Hana. (laughter) Now you all know what Beni Hana is. Beni Hana is the Japanese Steak House where they cook right in front of you. I needed a part time job, they needed a receptionist. I thought well my odds of getting a job here are pretty good. So this is where I became really a born again Oriental. They dressed me up in a kimono. (laughter) Let me tell you, I felt so conspicuous. I couldn’t tell you how embarrassed I was – not knowing that I just fit in with the rest of the scene. But, this is where I learned about other cultures. I learned how to use chopsticks. You won’t believe this, I learned how to use chopsticks cleaning out the ashtrays and pulling the butts out of the sand. That’s how I learned how to use chopsticks. For the first time I ate potatoes and onions sliced up with fish particles. I was eating all this strange stuff, but it was quite novel and interesting. So, that I was able to adapt pretty well. They would tease me. The Japanese chefs and the Korean chefs and all the other foreigners, would tease me and talk to me and teach me all the dirty words and I was sort of like them, but I wasn’t. They never let me forget that, but lo and behold I ended up meeting a Japanese Chef and I ended up marrying and that became my fourth life.
By that point I thought that I really need to give this a try and I thought that I could be the perfect subservient little Japanese wife. It didn’t matter that I was actually Korean, I didn’t know what that was and there was no one to tell me. And everybody else was Japanese, so I was going to try to be Japanese too. For five and ½ years, I tried to be Japanese and it was kind of fun at first to try to be the Japanese wife. We opened up our own sushi bar. That was the best kept secret. I pretended to be Japanese. People didn’t know I was Korean. They didn’t need to know. I started to learn the language. I know more about being Japanese than I know about being Korean, I can tell you that. But, that didn’t last either. Not to anybody’s surprise.
After that period, I decided I am going to go do everything that I ever wanted to do. I got divorced a second time and I ended up going to law school, which I never thought I would do. But, the law school experience is important because that is where I became a born again Asian. Not Oriental as I was so immediately told my first day at Georgetown. I will never forget, I am having this discussion. There are a bunch of people sitting around the lobby and we are talking and I just happened to refer to myself as Oriental. They were all over me. "You’re not oriental don’t you know you’re Asian you’re not oriental. You are not a lamp. You are not a rug." Oh my gosh and I thought I was a pretty politically aware person, and I didn’t mean to offend anybody. I was just ignorant. But that was the beginning of three years of learning, actually what it meant to be Asian. Because now I was with people from New York and California, and Chicago and people who had really been into this for awhile who were going to teach me what it was like to be Asian. This was the first time, at the age of 32, that I actually met a Korean girl who was American just like me. She spoke perfect English just like me. This was such a thrill! I cannot tell you. I will never forget it. Her name was Peggy! Maybe you know her she was from out here. (laughter) I was just so excited that at 32 there was someone just like me out there. Law school was a strange experience because there were more Asians in that law school than any other law school, as far as I know. I ended up, oddly enough, being the president of the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association. You know the least likely candidate for this. And here I am trying to bring together the students that were really into the Asian thing and bring together the other students who wanted nothing to do with the Asian thing. I fit in the middle because I had been on both ends of the spectrum.
So, I got through law school and went into my sixth life of politics. This is where I really became a born again Korean. I am back from law school and I am studying for the bar and my former boss, who had been a legislator decided she was going to run for congress. She called me up in the middle of the summer. I was studying for the bar and working full time. She wanted to know if I would like to run for her seat in the house, because she was going to run for congress. How are you going to say no when it is handed to you in your lap and this is something that you have always wanted to do. I ran. I campaigned. I went door to door. And, I found out that there was more than one Korean in the state of Florida. Somebody said, "you know there is a Korean dinner going on, it was August, something to do with Korean independence, and why don’t you go stop by and meet them." Sure ok, I will go campaign. They probably won’t be able to vote for me, but you know, why not. It’s the politically correct thing. Lo and behold, I walked into this room and there must have been 75 Koreans in West Palm Beach Florida, celebrating independence, whatever that meant, I didn’t know what that was about. But, at the age of 35, it was the first time that I had ever heard the Korean anthem, had Korean food, and sat there while the entire ceremony went on in Korean. Here I am sitting with my friend who is campaigning with me, this little white short blonde headed chubby let’s go get em. And she is sitting there cracking up and I am sitting there ready to cry. Because I thought wow this is incredible, this is where my parents came from. This is what my culture is about. It was the beginning. It was how I found out that there were actually other Koreans in Florida, all over Florida, who were ready to extend their arms to me. I will never forget that experience. There are actually a lot of Koreans in Florida, a huge community, and I say huge in terms of the support that they will give you. When I ran for re-election, I raised 30% of my money from the Asian community, people who never met me and knew nothing about me. I raised about $30,000 during that one campaign from the Asian community. That’s how I really became involved with the Koreans and to the extent that I got elected without their help, I was unique and an oddity to them – where did she come from. To me it was just the thing you do, if you are going to run for office, you go out, you knock on doors, you send out brochures. There was nothing different to me, but to the Asians in the state of Florida and to some of the rednecks in north Florida, they couldn’t get over it. I didn’t have a lot of Asians in the area I represented, a lot of rednecks, a lot of Jewish people. Jewish people tend to sympathize with Koreans, for whatever reason. It was no doubt the first time that some people in Tallahassee had ever seen in real life an Asian face – I truly believe that. If you know Tallahassee, Tallahassee is north Florida, Tallahassee is actually the south. South Florida is actually New York! (laughter) So, to go from West Palm Beach, South Florida up to Tallahassee, that is like going into Georgia or places like that. These are your red neck quail hunting, duck shooting people who have never been more than 50 miles from Tallahassee. So, that when they saw me up there, it was like "she’s one of those." There are some schools up there, so there are some interns, some people in the Capitol. But, when I would walk down the hall of the Capitol and I’d see somebody I knew and they would just walk right past me, I finally realized they didn’t know it was me. As far as they knew it was the staff person or someone that they would see occasionally, because you know "we all look alike." So, it was very interesting. I’ll never forget the time right after I’d gotten elected, I was sitting in my office. My name is on the outside of the door. I’m behind my desk, my secretary’s desk is outside and this lobbyist sticks his head in, hands me a little gift and says, "Do you know when Representative McAndrews will be back
k?" And I said, "No I’m not sure." "Well would you leave this for him, please?" I said, "Sure, I’ll take it." I don’t think I ever saw that lobbyist again in my entire career. But, that is just another part of the stereotype is that he couldn’t believe that the representative could possibly be me. He couldn’t believe that it could possibly be somebody who looked like me, with a name like MeAndrews. I had to be the aide or the secretary.
Probably the funniest experience I had up there was with this other state legislator from Tampa who was Cuban and his name was Alvin Martinez. He would constantly call me Kim. Constantly! In committee meetings, wherever we were at. So, one day I had just had it. And he called me Kim and I said, " well you know Pedro" (laughter) And the whole room burst out laughing. He was very embarrassed, but from that day on he never got my name wrong. I can tell you that.
It has made life very interesting, no doubt, and I made this little kind of top ten list of stereotypes that I have had to deal with and I am just going to name a few. Some of you in here will have had to deal with those yourself. So one of the stereotypes I remember is having to reveal that I am not a child prodigy. I happen to play the piano. I am taking violin lessons, but I am not a child prodigy. Just cause I look Korean, I am not a child prodigy. My violin teacher was so disappointed. Really, he was a college professor and he took me on because I was a cute little Korean who was going to play the violin and be a prodigy. Every time there was an article in the paper about a Korean musical artist, I got it, it came my way, copy Mimi. I didn’t understand what that was for except that they either expected me to be like them or is that what I’m going to be when I grow up. I didn’t know. I only know that I got the newspaper clippings. Maybe they are related to me, I don’t know.
I know some of you get this all the time, No I am not Chinese. There are some people who just don’t know beyond China what the other Asian cultures or countries are. They don’t have a clue. Well then you must be Japanese. No I am not Japanese either. What are you? Korea Oh, what’s that. I am sure that you have all had to deal with that at some time.
This is good. What, what did you say, Oh you just got out of the Vietnam War? No I am sorry, I don’t understand, I only speak English. I only speak English. Do you know how many times I have said, "I only speak English?" And being in Florida where there is a big population of Hispanics, I still have to say that. Where are you from? Oh you must be from Peru. No I am sorry, I don’t speak Spanish. I only speak English. Peru has a lot of Japanese down there. So, if I go out where there are Cubans, they think I must be Peruvian.
The other stereotype I still get is. "Oh you like Oriental women? Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I am not going to be the little subservient person that you are expecting to see." I get that all the time.
Oh, I used to get this in law school. No, I am sorry, I am not related to Christy Yamaguchi. She is not my sister, we’re not related. I wish I could skate like her. You know. (laughter)
Now this one I’ve gotten since law school. Every time I walk into a court room. Are you a reporter? I went in to a huge bankruptcy case that I had to sit in on for our client in federal court. The room was packed. I got there late, but at the end of the hearing the judge asked if there were any reporters in the room.. Now I have never been in a courtroom where the judge asked if there were reporters, but it has been inferred on more than one occasion that I must be a reporter when they see me in the court house.
And even now, "You do what at the National Safety Council? Are you the marketing assistant? What do you do there? You run the place! He works for you!" People can’t believe that someone who looks like me can actually be the head of a big organization. But, I run into it all the time.
The one that I still run into, even within the last month, people still call me Kim. They still think my first name is Kim. I get that to this day.
I want to thank Chris and Lindy and everyone for inviting me to be here and be a part of this conference. This has been a very emotional weekend. It has been very special. I have made a lot of new friends. I just want to say to all of the adopted children in here. Because you are adopted, you are unique. No matter how many thousands have been adopted, you are not going to spend the bulk of your life with people like you. I have no doubt that because I am adopted, I am probably a little more immune or ignorant when I am being discriminated against. I don’t recognize it, for good or bad. I have no doubt that because I am adopted, I am really more concerned about what is going on in Kosova than I am in certain parts of Asia. I have no doubt that because I am adopted, I am more independent, I am more self-reliant, I am more assertive, I am more aggressive, I am more determined. And I am more confident that I can do anything I set my mind to. Had I been raised in an Asian family, I would not be this person, I know. But, because I am adopted, I have gotten to where I am today.
Thank you very much!