An Adoptee's Movie: In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee by Deann Borshay Liem

Hi Everyone,

Last Monday, I went to the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival and I saw In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee by Deann Borshay Liem, who also made the movie First Person Plural.

It was an AMAZING movie, especially for people who do not know that much about adoptions from Korea.  The movie was informative, interesting, and heartwarming.

You can see more about the movie and Deann here, taken from an article on the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival's website:

INTERVIEW: DEANN BORSHAY LIEM



KOREAN ADOPTEE SWITCHEROO: FINDING THE REAL ‘CHA JUNG HEE’

Although documentary filmmaker Deann Borshay Liem had already delved into the topic of her identity as a Korean adoptee in her film FIRST PERSON PLURAL, there was a lingering issue that she felt was still unresolved, still nagging at her—the issue of Cha Jung Hee.

When Borshay Liem arrived in the US, no one thought to question her passport and papers stating that she was an orphan named Cha Jung Hee. The Borshay family had been corresponding regularly with the orphanage in Korea, sending money and receiving pictures of a girl named Cha Jung Hee. But that girl disappeared from the orphanage just as the Borshays wrote to say that they would like to adopt her. The orphanage arranged a switcheroo, replacing Cha Jung Hee with Borshay Liem, who was instructed not to reveal what had happened.

But six-year-old Borshay Liem knew that it was all a lie—her own family was still alive, and her name was not Cha Jung Hee. By the time she learned to speak English, she had already forgotten the truth about her history. It was not until college that she began to have flashbacks to her time at the orphanage, and that she became haunted by the idea that she was living someone else’s life.

IN THE MATTER OF CHA JUNG HEE documents Borshay Liem’s journey back to Korea some 50 years later to find the real Cha Jung Hee and solve the mysteries of her own identity. The film is screening at the Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival on Monday, May 3 at 7:00 PM at the Downtown Independent. BUY TICKETS Bearing her adoption documents, the shoes that the Borshays had sent to the orphanage, and a handful of photographs, she tirelessly searches for women her age named Cha Jung Hee.

“At first I think I had a simplistic notion of what the journey was,” said Borshay Liem. “That I would find this person and it would be fairly easy and I would give back her things and this would help me resolve these years of mistaken identity. But it turned out to be much deeper than that.”

Part of her journey includes meeting a diverse array of women named Cha Jung Hee. Even if they are not the right Cha Jung Hee, seeing what their lives are like is still an important piece of her puzzle.

“These women were all my generation, and I think through hearing about their struggles and successes, their experiences growing up in Korea which would have been similar to my own life if I had stayed, it gave me an insight and a connection,” she said. “I felt that was very healing for me. I think that girl adoptees are told that if they had stayed in Korea they would have been prostitutes, or end up with some terrible fate. But these women grew up and they did struggle but they had also survived and in some cases flourished.”

The film unfolds as a personal essay, with Borshay Liem narrating her own process of questioning and discovery. Through the course of the film she begins to understand with more clarity her relationship to her adopted and birth families, to the US as a country, and to herself. She believes that making the film has given her some closure on the issue of Cha Jung Hee.

“I think part of it has to do with simply claiming this life that I’m living now as my own,” she said. “In part that’s what the search was about, to allow myself to embrace my life as my own and not having belonged to someone else. I’m here and it’s ok that I’m here.” BUY TICKETS






-Lori Kido Lopez

I'm Alive and in America

Hi everyone...

I know it's been over a month... but it takes time to get over the jetlag and to catch up with my friends.

So, I'm back home, safe and sound.

I promise to catch up because I have some great pictures... but for now, I just wanted to give you this link to the great article from the Los Angeles Times.  It talks about gyopos (people who live in a country that is not Korea, but have Korean descent) and how they are treated in Korea.  I felt that it mirrored my own experiences there, and was far better written than I could have done.

See what you think; here's the link:  http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/14/world/la-fg-korea-return14-2010feb14

And I PROMISE, i will post my excellent pictures very soon.

Chopsticks AND a Spoon

Many of my fellow "Native" English Teachers who had never been to Korea before, but were familiar with chopsticks, were surprised when I told them to eat their rice with their spoon.  They were trying to fit in by eating with their chopsticks, but didn't realize that they woud fit in just as well if they ate their rice with their spoon.

I, personally, always think Koreans are pretty clever with their metal chopstick/spoon combo.  First, I like that it's metal, which is far more sanitary than wood, more substantial than plastic, and also does it's own little part in saving the environment.  Second, I like the fact that you have options; if it is too hard to eat your rice with the chopsticks, go for it with the spoon... if you are a picky eater like I am, go ahead and pick the onions out of the soup with the chopsticks.  Finally, I like that you have the option of using both hands to eat, even though older customs dictate against it; that means I can divide that big piece of Kase (that's Tonkatsu, for those who don't know), by splitting it with my chopsticks and spoon.

If you ever wondered where the whole chopstick/spoon thing came from, here's a link:

http://www.buddhapia.com/eng/extensive/4-a5a1.html

I thought it was interesting and seemed  correct.

(I took that lovely picture from this website, which also has an interesting, but gramatically poor, article about chopsticks and spoons in Korea, Japan, and China: http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://www.prkorea.com/engnews/wys/file_attach/1184303793spoon%26chopsticks.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.prkorea.com/engnews/index.cgi%3Faction%3Ddetail%26number%3D518%26thread%3D10r01&usg=__vkw2SQ7PUmhpsA5CRW3f3VF4_2U=&h=800&w=600&sz=90&hl=en&start=5&sig2=sZqlt-rR_iGayhHwpMlnPQ&um=1&tbnid=JPlKCxlYFoRgLM:&tbnh=143&tbnw=107&prev=/images%3Fq%3DKorean%2Bchopsticks%2Band%2Bspoon%26hl%3Den%26rls%3Dcom.microsoft:en-us:IE-SearchBox%26rlz%3D1I7DVXA_en%26sa%3DN%26um%3D1&ei=pDxMS7NvhKa2A_na6IoB .)