My Purpose

View from the train between Incheon and Seoul.

 

I decided to return to my birth place to begin a journey that I knew I would eventually have to take. I was adopted by an Australian couple in December 1992 when I was just six months old. I was raised Australian, and English became my native language. I grew up in a regional town called Orange in New South Wales and had a relatively normal childhood bar being of Asian ethnicity while was my parents were Caucasian.

 I took a chance and did it this year because I remember speaking to a co-worker at the reception job I used to have about being adopted. He was well into his fifties, probably in his early sixties and he looked me straight in the eye and said, "I didn't search for my mother until I was 45, I found out she had passed away a year earlier. Don't wait and lose the opportunity." The next day I rang my mother up and told her to book me tickets right away. Without hesitation she did, and six months later I was on a plane to South Korea, the day after my 20th birthday.I had deferred university for a year, moved out of my Unilodge accommodation and packed my bags for a ten week journey.

 As we flew over the bright green rice fields and sleek highrise apartments and landed at Incheon Airport I remember crying uncontrollably. I flew Korean Air, so all the people around me were Koreans and I remember them looking at me while I cried. But not in judgement, in empathy. They were returning to their homeland as well. Its like when you return to Australia on Qantas, and although you joke and laugh how tacky it is, you have this indescribable feeling in your heart as they play "I Still Call Australia Home".

As my friend and I strolled through the airport to baggage claim, I found it so bizarre to be around so many Koreans. I felt kinship with them, yet I couldn't understand them. It wasn't until we were on the airport line train with our suitcases as everyone on the train sat quietly playing movies on their phones that I felt the cultural distance. 

With time it has improved a little, but the gap has also widened. I am writing this blog to help out other travellers who are going to Seoul or are in Seoul at the moment as well as the unique perspective of an adoptee returning to Korea. I myself found there was a lack of Korean travel blogs for Westerners or the ones that do exist were not entirely detailed.

I am also using this as a medium to catalogue my trip, so in many years to come I can look upon it fondly. I hope it helps whoever uses it and I welcome and comments or questions.

~Elise So Yun