Reflections

Now that I've been home for almost a week, my Seoul experience has really begun to take shape and put into perspective. It is an amazing culture, and like many cultures, filled with contradictions and juxtapositions. From my observations, Koreans care deeply about appearance. They are often dressed more formally than in the US and from the looks of the skin of Korean women, use fabulous products to keep their skin smooth and fresh. However, tons of Koreans smoke. You didn't walk by an office building without scores of men smoking in front of it. Yet, another sect is wearing face masks. Every culture has it's contradictions but to go from smoking in front of a building to seeing someone wearing a face mask, it is difficult to ignore.

The respect for the elderly was amazing to watch on the subway. If a person of a certain age got on the subway, another passenger immediately stood up to give them their seat. This is in stark contrast to the US where people would prefer to put up The Washington Post in front of their face than give up their seat. While I was offered seats many times while carrying Sarah, I always politely declined because I was able to stand the entire ride and many of those people offering me their seat probably had a worse day than I did. And, boy, can Koreans sleep on subways!

I often wondered as I got on the subway in Seoul "what do these people think about me and what I'm doing?" Are they thinking "oh good, another baby has a family." Or, were they thinking "Here comes another American tourist picking up one of our children." Everyone was very sweet to Sarah on the subway but I often wondered what was in their "thought bubble" above their head.

Another reflection I had was that of the cultural minority. I'm white. Mostly Irish/Italian and a whole bunch of other things thrown in for good measure but I am white and enjoy white privilege just because of the color of my skin. Being the person that "stood out" in a relatively homogeneous society was very eye opening for me. I felt like most people were looking at me, some wanted to take pictures with me and then I thought that some people (especially when traveling with Sarah) were talking about me. It gave me a perspective on what it is like for a minority in the US to live or work in a world where you can be privileged based on the color of your skin.

Respect for the land is another cultural priority that was interesting to me. Everywhere we went there were trash receptacles, recycle bins, clean streets, tree trimming, etc. The outward appearance of the city is pristine. Love for the land was reinforced when I asked Jonathan (our tour guide) about ski resorts. He said there was no skiing in Korea because they felt the mountains had an energy and to disrupt those mountains would bring about negative energy.

Jonathan felt we were lucky we spoke English so well. We felt dumb in that English was the only language we spoke. We asked Jonathan so many questions about Korea that we felt like we were hogging the conversation. When we asked Jonathan if he had any questions for us about the US, he asked about the mortgage collapse. Here, I know minimal about the Korean economy and this kid is asking me about the mortgage collapse in the US. So knowledgeable about our economic and political system. Our country has a lot of power, with that power should come a great responsibility to the rest of the world. But, obviously we don't. Greed is allowed to continue with not only implications for our citizens, but for global citizens as well.

Finally, Koreans obviously cares about their children. If they didn't, there wouldn't be an international adoption program. I understand on the surface why Koreans may be opposed to adoption, but when one looks deeper you can see that there is not greater love for a child then finding them a home in which they will thrive. Whether that be in your country or another. We are grateful to Korea for maintaining an international program as many work hard to promote adoption within Korea. A truly successful program would result in homes for all children that need them

This is the Holt bunny. All of our kids have their pictures taken with this bunny at some point.. :)