Men + Marriage + Adoption = ?? My History with the Opposite Sex

My blog has been a bit depressing, confronting and heavy as of late. And my circumstances in life took a bit of a turn for the worst last week. But it’s almost Christmas, so I’m going to try and make my posts a little bit more light hearted for a while.

In the documentary section of Adopted the Movie, one of the adoptees who gets interviewed says:

I was a teenager, and I was with my mother, and we started talking about guys that I would date, who I’d marry, and I remember she said very matter-of-factly: “you will most likely marry a white guy”. In the back of my mind, I was like ‘yeah. She’s completely right, because I live in a white neighbourhood, I grew up in a white family, I hardly see anybody else that looks like me, so it’s probably true’. But I also thought ‘what if I do marry someone that’s not white? How would they respond?’.

A few months ago at work, we were talking about members of the opposite sex and our spouses etc etc. One of my friends/coworkers at the time commented that she’s attracted to men of Indian background (which is also her own ethnic background). I kind of thought about it then. Not a lot, considering I’m married, but I did go away and think about it…

My husband is white. He’s very white. (I don’t mean that in a bad way.) He comes from one of the most caucasian families I’ve ever met. Despite the fact that he’s now quite bald, he has blonde hair, (gorgeous) blue eyes and the palest skin. His sister is tall, very blonde and also quite pale. As are… the majority of his family! But walking away from the conversation I had at work, I found myself wondering: do our upbringings and environments really affect who we’re attracted to in the opposite sex? Growing up, of course I realised there was such a thing as “Asian men” in the world. But I’d always felt that my being Korean was something to be ashamed of – it was always second rate to being white, so I never considered the possibility of being with someone Asian, let alone finding them attractive…

Looking back at my history in regards to men, it seems that environment really does affect our tastes. For most of my school life I attended a very privileged all-girls’ school in Sydney. So my first “realisation” of men, I remember, came at my best friend’s birthday slumber party one year in primary school. We were watching Speed. And I remember most of my friends swooning over Keanu Reeves, talking about how “hot” he was and such. I kind of agreed at the time, but wasn’t really sure.

In the years that followed, as a typical teenager, I found certain celebrities “hot”: celebrities I always saw in magazines and on the TV. For a while, I had a thing for Leonardo DiCaprio when he starred in Romeo and Juliet (what girl didn’t?! I think all our school diaries had pictures of him stuck on all the pages!). I also had a big thing for the Backstreet Boys (yes, my taste in music kinda sucks. LOL.), particularly Nick Carter.

I didn’t really have any exposure to Korea, Korean pop culture or Korean celebrities. In fact, I wasn’t even aware they existed at all, nor did I really think about it. Like the adoptee quoted above, I always imagined myself marrying someone white. I never imagined myself ever being with someone that wasn’t caucasian. Past boyfriends also seem to reflect this a little.

I didn’t go out with a lot of people. I was always kind of shy… not really sure what to say to members of the opposite sex and also kind of fussy. But my first main boyfriend was very blonde. In fact, he kind of resembled Nick Carter (I’m sure he’d kill me if he heard me say that. LOL). He even had a little brother who looked like Aaron! He also had very blue eyes, had an emo, rebellious sort of personality (at the time, anyway) and was simply just a good friend. We went out for… a couple of years. At the time, though, that was when I began to “discover” Asia and Asian pop culture – something I totally fell in love with, simply because I could somewhat relate to the people I’d see. And I think that was the time in my life where my tastes in blonde white guys broadened a little to include guys of my own racial background… something I found a little enlightening and empowering, to a degree.

Out of my constant love of boy bands, came my “discovery” of 신화 (Shinhwa. Literally “legend”. LOL.). The six-member pop group started my realisation that there was a whole world called “Korea” out there! Their music was catchy, they sang in Korean – “my” language, and they were hot! (OMG! Hot Asian guys?! There’s such a thing?!!) From there, I got into Korean dramas and learnt about the Korean Wave (popularity of Korean pop culture sweeping the world). To me, it was just amazing to find an entire world of pop that I could relate to! A world that consisted of people that I looked like! That actually came from the country I was born in! It was also amazing to realise that Korea isn’t “just” some poor country that is second rate to Australia and the US – it has some degree of wealth and power, and a culture that is loved by people all over the world! It made me wonder, like the adoptee quoted above, what it would be like if I did marry someone Korean. How would my family react? What would that do to me as a person? To my identity?

My next boyfriend, although half Asian (Malaysian – a culture/country I can’t really relate to, nor am I interested in), was a mistake on my part, and is a part of my life I still wish I could erase from existence. I haven’t much to say about him, aside from – we all make mistakes in life. And being with him was one of my biggest.

권상우 - 진짜 멋있어! Kwon Sang Woo - hot! LOL.

I think meeting and going out with Robert (my now-husband), though, has proven the mixture of what it means to be a transracial adoptee – I felt I was “becoming” more Korean by learning the language and learning about the culture, but at the same time, I was dating an extremely caucasian guy. It was hard to reconcile both worlds, but in the end… isn’t that part of the struggle we adoptees simply have to live with? We may not like it (admittedly, I really hate it), but… what else can we do?

Even today, I still struggle with balancing my two worlds. Are they meant to be mixed? Or do they remain separate. Sometimes it feels like I live between two opposing magnets. Which side do I go to? Which side does my husband really belong to? Although I love being married, I still wonder sometimes, whether it was “right” for me and my life to marry someone of such caucasian background. I love Robert, but where does it leave my life? However, like the quoted adoptee above says: how would my family have reacted if I had married someone Korean? I’m sure they’d say they would have been supportive, but would they have felt that way if I’d entered into a family whose culture they themselves wouldn’t have understood or related to? It’s easy to say we’d be supportive of whatever our loved ones choose, but in reality, I don’t think things are that simple. Yes, they can learn, but they’ll never really be a part of one of the worlds we adoptees will always be a part of. Just like we’ll never really be a whole part of our adopted societies.

비담 - BiDam - Best character from 선덕여왕 (Queen SeonDeok)!

Our spouses may not always seem like the most significant part of our adoption journeys. But when it comes down to it, they really are. As do our attractions to certain members of the opposite sex.

In conclusion: I do think that in looking back at my history with men does show the affect my environment has had on the types of people I’d consider spending the rest of my life with – “finding” Korea opened up new opportunities for me. And I think that’s important for adoptive parents to consider – if your child married someone of their birth culture/s… how would you react? Do you give your child those opportunities? Yes, it’s easy to say you’d be supportive, but really… what would it mean for you? For your family? For your child? Hypothetically, if I’d married someone Korean, I don’t really know how my family would have reacted. And I don’t really think that’s something they could answer, either. Furthermore, I disagree with telling your child that “you think they’re going to marry someone white”. That puts expectations on them. Wouldn’t it be better for them to find out themselves? I used to think that it would be nice to marry someone Korean (before I married Robert of course). Why? Because I felt like they’d be able to relate to me, and I to them – they’d be able to relate to the part of me that usually gets pushed aside or ignored. And it would be nice to spend my life with someone who understood that, despite what it would mean for my adoptive family. I really wonder how my life would have ended up, had I had more exposure to Korea when I was growing up… it kind of makes me sad that I didn’t, but all I can do is try and make up for lost time now.

Related posts:

1. Boys, Girls, Marriage… Adoption?
2. Marriage…
3. “Alleluia, it’s Raining Men. Amen.”
4. Interview with the Husband
5. “But Where Are You Really From?”