My Favorite Posts

In order to boast about how awesome I am enter a contest for a $250 Target gift card at Barking Mad, I’m listing five of my own favorite posts below.  I know I haven’t written a “real” post in a while so I have to dig back a bit, but here they are, in order of original appearance:

1. Living in Color — this is an oldie but I still like it, and still think that it’s true.  As much as adult adoptees stress the importance of growing up in diverse communities, it still seems to be the absolute last thing that white adoptive parents want to do.

2. Better Than What? — Again, kind of an old post about an even older argument, but not a week goes by where I don’t hear some variant on that tired old “Well, would you have rather grown up in an orphanage?” bullsh*t.  Um, really?  Why are people so uncreative (not to mention narrow-minded) that they can’t envision any other scenarios?   Oh right… because this is the one that will most justify giving them what they want.

3. An Inconvenient Truth –  written during the adoption-as-second-best debate last year.  I know that it hurts parents to let their children hurt, but I also think that adoptive parents need to practice seeing things from adoptees’ viewpoints, as unsettling as that might be for the parents personally.  What I wrote in this post is certainly is not universal and not every adoptee would agree with me, but based on feedback I got in the comments, there were quite a few who did.

4.  NaJuPicMo – July 31 – Shadows — This pretty much summed up my time in Korea, and showcases my attempt at artsy photography as well.  Because if a ill-lit, out-of-focus, poorly-composed, grainy picture accompanied by text that tries to explain why all the faults are actually intentional can’t be considered art, then I don’t know what can.

5. What Price, Peace? — The bravery of the son in this post makes me hopeful.  And also begs the question of whether or not I could do what he did with my own family — to be honest, I’m not sure that I could, or at least not as calmly and rationally as he did.  Maybe I could hire him to talk to my parents too?

Anyhoo, that’s it for me.  Want to play?  Just click on over to Barking Mad and play by her rules:

All you have to do to enter for a chance to win the $250 Target Gift card is create a post which links to your Top 5 or 10 Favorite Posts.    They can be your funniest, most profound, thoughtful, entertaining…whatever.  Just as long as they are your favorites. Then, once you’ve done that, come back here and link that post in the Mr. Linky area and LEAVE A COMMENT ON THIS POST!  Also,  make sure, somewhere in your post, that you link back here to Barking Mad!  The contest runs through tonight, until march 4th, 2009 at 10:00PM EST.

Thanks to the fabulousness that is Coco for the contest tip!

(Curiously, my supposed #1 “Top Post” that has been seen by the most people and undoubtedly received the most attention is nowhere to be seen on this list…)

Important Stuff of Which I Am Not a Part

… but wish that I were:

(excerpted from Jane Jeong Trenka’s blog)

The first public hearing on revision to Korea’s adoption law is Thursday at 10 a.m. at the Fransisco Education Center in Seoul.  [...] THIS IS REALLY IMPORTANT. This is history-making time. They are talking about three things:

1. Ratifying the Hague Convention

2. Domestic adoption law

3. Korea’s “special” adoption law that allows international adoptions.

[...]

Damn, I have never sat so long in a meeting where people were trying to figure out how is the best way to take children from mothers instead of keep them with them. Perhaps I was not understanding everything, but it’s not like the government or this panel thought that adoptee opinion was important enough to make anything happen in a language other than Korean anway.

[...]

So please please clear that calendar and come. If this isn’t important, I don’t know what is. If you never got moving for anything else ever, move for this one. This is about YOUR HUMAN RIGHTS.

Please read Jane’s entire post here.

I’m not in Seoul right now, but it seems like there’s big stuff going on there these days regarding adoption and support for single mothers.  Big, important government-type people are talking about us, and folks like Dae-Won of GOA’L and Jane are trying to make sure that adoptees are at the table.

People need to see our faces and bodies present so that they know we are not invisible.  They need to hear our voices so they know what we — the objects of their actions — actually think. They need to know that we are involved and that we care… and there needs to be enough of us so that they bother to bridge the same communication chasm that they created in the first place.

If you are an adoptee in Seoul right now, please consider getting involved… if not for yourself, then for all of us sitting here in countries outside of Korea with hands that are itching to actually DO something, to actually create change rather than just talk about how nice it would be if we had it.

This is your chance.

Quote of the Day

From Cheri Register, adoptive parent to two daughters from Korea:

“They [adult adoptees] have more to gain from talking to each other and building community than from arguing with adoptive parents, either their own or the collective bunch of us.”

- from Beyond Good Intentions: A Mother Reflects on Raising Internationally Adopted Children

I just started reading this book, but thought this quote was particularly appropriate for me right now.

I Knew It

Clicking on the link for “Post-Adoption Services” on the “Korean FAQs” section of Holt-USA’s web page brought up the following image:

I know that someone just forgot to update a few links… but I thought it was funny just the same.