Mayda Miller, 34, is a Korean adoptee and fronts her namesake rock band in the Twin Cities. From Incheon, South Korea, Miller was adopted to Minnesota spent a lot of her youth competing in sports and classical piano competitions but later found her true calling to make funk, blues and punk-influenced rock music. Miller’s story includes meeting her Korean biological parents and living with complicated emotions about them and Korea as a result.

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Credits:

Mayda Miller “The Han”
Mayda Miller “Sylvia”
Mayda Miller “Verite”
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Entwined Oddity”
Blue Dot Sessions “Lupi”
Blue Dot Sessions “Gatinha Rosa”
Blue Dot Sessions “Tartaruga”
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Korean adoptee Annie Malecek, 24, learned as an adult she was conceived from rape. Violence also played a role at a pivotal moment for the Chicago resident when she first realized that having white parents and being raised in a privileged environment would not shield her from racism, prejudice and of being a target for aggression. To find where she fit in America, Malecek had to travel back to Korea, to see and feel and think in the land where it had all begun. Along the way, she found answers, and a peace.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Swell”
Blue Dot Sessions “Entwined Oddity”
Blue Dot Sessions “Slimeheart”
Blue Dot Sessions “Holo”
Blue Dot Sessions “Basketliner”
Blue Dot Sessions “Pelliu”
Blue Dot Sessions “Loom”
Blue Dot Sessions “Lovers Hollow”
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The notion of family is a complicated one for Korean adoptee Jimmy Byrne. The 35-year old Chicagoan shares his story of profound loss and reunion — and how each continues to shape his life and relationships. Byrne also talks about coming to terms with all aspects of his identity as a gay Asian male, a musician, a transracial adoptee, and as a Korean-American. Through it all, Byrne’s humanity and quiet strength shines through.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “November Mist”
Blue Dot Sessions “Glass Beads”
Blue Dot Sessions “Pictures Of The Floating World”
Blue Dot Sessions “Insatiable Toad”
Blue Dot Sessions “Stucco Blue”
Blue Dot Sessions “Paper Feather”
Blue Dot Sessions “Taoudella”
Blue Dot Sessions “City Limits”
Blue Dot Sessions “Um Pepino”
Blue Dot Sessions “Entrance Shaft”
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Elliot Mark, 23, is a Korean adoptee who is also Jewish. He grew up in Skokie, Illinois, the grandson of Russian Jewish immigrants and credits his close-knit family with helping him forge a strong identity. Mark also embraces his Korean origins and has recently joined a local group for Korean adoptees to help build his community. Mark shares how he has learned to find his place between cultures and time, with the love and support of all his family.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “This Our Home”
Blue Dot Sessions “The Coil Winds”
Blue Dot Sessions “Doghouse”
Blue Dot Sessions “Home Home At Last”
Blue Dot Sessions “O Holy Still”
Blue Dot Sessions “Vengeful”
Blue Dot Sessions “The Big Ten”
Blue Dot Sessions “Curio”
Blue Dot Sessions “Sine And Wither”
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Korean adoptee Milton Washington, 48, has learned how to live between two worlds ever since he was adopted at the age of eight by an African-American military family. Washington, or Pak Milton-ah, spent his early years under the shadow of rejection by Korean society because of his mixed-blood heritage and outcaste because of his mother’s profession and association with black U.S. soldiers. After being adopted into a loving and somewhat unusual family, and raised in the American midwest, he realized he still had demons to overcome. As a black Korean, Washington also had to make sense of his identity in the U.S., and has come to understand and embrace both sides of his history. And what he would like to say to his Korean eomma, Pak Young-ja, one day.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Tower of Mirrors”
Blue Dot Sessions “Peacetime”
Blue Dot Sessions “Bivly”
Blue Dot Sessions “Pacing”
Blue Dot Sessions “PlataZ”
Blue Dot Sessions “This Our Home”
Blue Dot Sessions “Platax”
Blue Dot Sessions “Grey Grey Joe”
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Korean adoptee Dan Sieling, 30, is on a journey. He shares his story drawing from both great insight and deep vulnerability — but all necessary in order to reclaim his identity and relationship with his native country. He talks about how he reconciles the pain from the loss of his biological family and his abandonment. The New Jersey resident also speaks about confronting some uncomfortable truths about adoption, learning how to accept and love, and how it has helped him to heal.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “These Times”
Blue Dot Sessions “Betty Dear”
Blue Dot Sessions “Drone Thistle”
Blue Dot Sessions “Drone Pine”
Blue Dot Sessions “A Palace of Cedar”
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Korean adoptee Teri Thomas is a fighter. Adopted from Goyang to the U.S., Thomas survived sexual abuse by her adoptive father soon after arriving at the age of six. Her experiences in a dysfunctional and abusive adoptive home affected how she has felt about her adoption agency Holt Korea, and about the policy of intercountry and transracial adoption. Thomas has cerebral palsy, and while it does limit some of her physical mobility, it doesn’t affect her spirit. The 48-year old returned to Korea in 2017 to work on an initiative to fight stigma and improve the opportunities for Korean children with disabilities. 

Note: This story contains themes of child sexual abuse, incest, clergy abuse, suicide and physical violence. 

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Rose Ornamental”
Blue Dot Seesions “Headlights Mountain Road”
Blue Dot Sessions “Topslides”
Blue Dot Sessions “Felt Lining”
Blue Dot Sessions “Feathered”
Blue Dot Sessions “Great Is The Contessa”
Blue Dot Sessions “Tiny Putty”
Blue Dot Sessions “Milkwood”
Pictures Of The Floating World “Cloud Chamber”
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Rachel Kim Tschida, 39, is a Korean adoptee who grew up in Minnesota, ambivalent about her own Asian identity for most of that time. However, she talks about learning to authentically embrace herself after traveling to Asia on business trips for a major American company. Those trips – especially ones back to Korea – helped spark an interest in her own adoption history, and in turn, become an advocate for other adoptees as president of the Korean American Coalition of Washington.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “On Three Legs”
Blue Dot Sessions “Floor Shine”
Blue Dot Sessions “Peacoat”
Blue Dot Sessions “Thread Caramb”
Blue Dot Sessions “Turning On The Lights”
Blue Dot Sessions “Easement”
Blue Dot Sessions “Headlights Mountain Road”
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John Park*, 34, is a kinship Korean adoptee. Park is an alias because he does not have legal status in the U.S., despite being brought to the U.S. from Korea as a young child and later adopted by Americans. Adoptee rights advocates estimate there are at least 35,000 foreign-born adopted people in the U.S. who, like Park, never received U.S. citizenship. Efforts to fix an immigration loophole in adoption in 2001 did not address individuals adopted outside the law’s restrictions on age and approved arrival visas. Advocates are hoping to change that with a new bill this year, though passage has so far proved politically challenging. Ultimately, Park’s adoption story is about survival and circumstance, pain and redemption. And hope.

Note: This episode contains themes of child sex abuse and violence.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Drch”
Blue Dot Sessions “Gtks”
Blue Dot Sessions “Floor Shine”
Blue Dot Sessions “Domina Transit”
Blue Dot Sessions “Tripoli”
Blue Dot Sessions “Pickers”
Blue Dot Sessions “Flower”
Blue Dot Sessions “Lakal”
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Greg Norrish, 32, is about to launch a new venture in South Korea with everything he’s learned after more than a decade in kitchens in the U.S., and about fourteen months in his native country. The experience of planting himself amidst an exploding foreign food scene in Seoul has also given him a chance to learn more about himself, reflect on his adoption from Korea and understand more about his native country — including confronting uncomfortable attitudes on gender and violence, which has exposed a darker side of Korean modern society.

Credits:
Jahzzar “Schmaltz”
Blue Dot Sessions “Hickory Shed”
Blue Dot Sessions “A Little Powder”
Blue Dot Sessions “Petaluma”
Blue Dot Sessions “Lemon And Melon”
Blue Dot Sessions “Sunday Lights”
Blue Dot Sessions “Hickory Interlude”
Blue Dot Sessions “Maisie Lee”
Blue Dot Sessions “Gathering Stasis”
Blue Dot Sessions “One Needle”
Blue Dot Sessions “Maisie Dreamer”
Blue Dot Sessions “Town Market”
Blue Dot Sessions “Sylvestor”
Blue Dot Sessions “Cradle Rock”
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