Unexpected File Review

"They are the gatekeepers. They are guarding all the doors, they are holding all the keys." ~Morpheus

Day 11

Life is very unpredictable.

Today I had my official file review with my assigned case/social worker at Holt Korea. For those who don't know all this pretty basic adoptee-lingo, a file review is a meeting in which one gets access to their adoption papers. My parents have a copy of my Holt USA (English) papers since I was adopted at 4 months old. What information we did have was openly shared with me all my life. But sometimes the US copies are not as complete as the Korean copies. Some information is left out, toned down, or lost in translation in the US copies. If the adoption agency has any identification information on members of a birth family, like names, addresses or social security, it would be in the Korean copy only.

So anyways, I'm doing my usually routine in the early afternoon. About to teach at an afterschool program, so I decide to swing by the Holt office to pick up some workbook materials. They have a huge box of English kids books and teaching resources. While I'm sitting there browsing books, my social worker yells from across the room, hey Chris, I happened to have your file sitting on my desk, want your file review? Of course I said yes. The crazy thing about this whole situation, is that for my whole life I figured my adoption file in Korea would be hidden underground in a huge metal Italian Job, Ocean's Eleven vault. And to get that information, I would either have to James Bond it, or jump over some crocodiles on ropes, Pitfall style. But in reality it went down in an almost too casual of manner. "Oh hey Chris, I happened to have this file, that you've been waiting to see your whole life, which contains the most precious information that you could ever want, sitting in an old shoebox under my desk."

I have always known, that I was born in a farming community on the outskirts of Masan to an old Korean widow, who most likely thought she was too old to even biologically get preggo in the eggo, let alone take care of another child. I knew I had 5 older half-siblings as well. Today I learned the same story, but with a little more detail. My birth mother was born in 1939. I was born in 1986. Do the math, cause I lost the piece of paper where I calculated it all out. I also learned my 5 older half-siblings are all girls. Crazy… I'm a little glad I didn't grow up in that family. Coincidentally, I am also reading Bertha & Harry Holt's Seed from the East, in which I learned the Holt family had 5 girls and 1 boy. The oldest sister is 45 years old, almost old enough to be my mother.

After I was told all this information, the social worker wrapped up by telling me she had all the official names of my family members, which they openly gave to the adoption agency at the time of my birth, and their social security numbers. Apparently, as was explained to me, a Korean social security number has more super powers than an American one does. You can learn a lot more about a person with it, and it wouldn't be too hard to track them down. So she asked plain and simply, if you want us to run these names and numbers through the Korean Police Department, we will. I said yes. I have yet to even begin to think about the crazy stuff like meeting them, or establishing contact, but this seems like a good buffer start. They are going to gather reconnaissance about them, find out if they are still alive, and where they live, but not yet approach them.

Things happen when you never expect them to.

So a bit of advice to all my adoptee brothers and sisters, if you were adopted through Holt, and want to start a birth search. Come to Korea. It's a pretty basic, simple process.