Korea, Again
I’m writing from Seoul where I’m connecting with old friends as well as doing a few presentations, including talking about my graphic novel, The Legend of Hong Kil Dong, with a classroom of Korean 6th graders – in Korean! Quite a stretch for my language skills, requiring learning/trying to recall a whole set of vocabulary: editor, research, picture book, manuscript, theme, final art, etc. (Another group of vocabulary is easier because it’s just a Korean pronunciation of the English word: sketch = su-keh-chi; character = keh-rik-tuh, and so on.)
Next week I’ll be joined by my mother and siblings, to take some of my father’s ashes to Geoje Island for a memorial service and reunion with former staff members, colleagues and friends. (Dad was the director of the Kojedo Community Health Project from 1969-1978.)
Read MoreParenting Across Race
A new essay I wrote,”Raising Yunhee” on transracial adoption and parenting across race, has just been published at Korean American Story.
“Adopting Yunhee was one journey; raising her was another. My own passion for Korea, which became my second homeland and the source of my second culture and second language, made me determined to give Yunhee a sense of her birth legacy. But how does a white American, even one who grew up in Korea, raise a Korean American – on an island in Maine?“
The essay examines how we attempted to give our daughter not just a sense of where she came from, but also encouragement to voice her experience of growing up as an American of color, and the challenge that posed for us as white parents:
“Talking about race gave Yunhee permission and language to unpack her own observations and experiences, and a structure for understanding the nuances of racial identity in America. At various ages and stages, it helped her find her voice to express her grief, her rage, her confusion (at age six, “Why couldn’t somebody in Korea take care of me?”)… It was essential for me not just to convey that all her thoughts and feelings were welcome, but also to become aware enough of the filter of my own white and non-adopted privilege that I could respect Yunhee’s authority in naming realities as she perceived them. I had to work to not inadvertently discount her observations and difficulties just because I wished they weren’t true.”
Korean American Story is building a fine and useful archive of narratives across the spectrum of Korean American identity, a significant contribution to exploring what it means to be American.
Go take a look.
Shanghai!
In October, I spent two delightful weeks at Shanghai American School. The school has two campuses, one to the west (Puxi), one to the east (Pudong) of downtown Shanghai, and an international student body of 3200! (I was told that it’s also the largest employer of expats in China.)
I connected with SAS through my sister-in-law’s brother, Jonathan Borden, who is the current high school principal at the Pudong campus, and his wife, Soon-ok, who teaches kindergarten. (We all worked together on Koje Island in Korea in 1975.)
Soon-ok’s class, like the entire student body, comes from all over the world.
Jonathan shared my books with librarian Barbara Boyer (here, with me and staff member Ruby, on the Bund, with some of the world’s tallest buildings behind us), who invited me to SAS.
The extraordinary team of librarians had planned a full schedule of presentations, from pre-K to high school Art, focusing on about a dozen of my titles.
I had fun surprising the Korean-American students by introducing myself in Korean.
There was even time for sharing writing and reading with individual students – so sweet.
Most of my time was spent in the international school community, but I was taken on a few forays into the city, where I ate some fabulous meals – soup dumplings!, Szechuan, Yunnan, Thai, Japanese; explored local markets; met new acquaintances …
and got a glimpse of the extraordinary contrast between people’s lives at different ends of the economic spectrum.
It was amazing to travel to China, retracing a journey my great-grandparents made one hundred and twenty-one years ago. I can’t wait to go back!
Tribute
He taught me in words, but more powerfully in deeds, that we are all one family, that every person I meet is my sister or brother, that each of us has infinite and equal worth and value.
And that, given this truth, we can only respond to the world as it is with fierce compassion, a fire for justice, and a desire to alleviate suffering wherever it is found.
He modeled a hunger for and delight in connection across differences of race, class, religion, language and culture.
He dared to imagine a better world, to see visions of what was possible, and to give his all in pursuit of a dream.
Read MoreHe inspired me to shine.
Exploring a Bicultural Experience
One of my favorite blogs, Korean American Story, has just published a piece I was invited to write for them, “Of Longing and Belonging.”
This relatively new blog has already built a thoughtful and insightful collection of essays and fiction on what it means to be Korean and American, including immigrant, U.S.-born, and adoptee perspectives.
Read MoreEncounter
Yesterday I spoke on a panel for an SCBWI New England event on using marketing consultants at the Eric Carle Museum in Amherst, Massachusetts. Lovely to make the trip with Kirsten Cappy of Curious City, and writer-illustrator Cathryn Falwell.
During lunch we got to spend a few minutes viewing the exhibit of Kadir Nelson paintings published in the book, We Are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball. The illustrations are stunning, and the exhibit far more so, because the actual oil paintings are huge.
Entering the gallery, you encounter the life-size figure of catcher and slugger Josh Gibson, who hit 75 home runs in 1931. The painting (also the book’s cover illustration) is hung so that the ball player and museum visitor meet eye to eye. Gibson has a powerful, almost mythical presence, rendered with extraordinary lifelike detail, from gleaming flesh to fraying fabric around the collar. Brushstrokes in the surrounding sky suggest motion, as if the air around the still figure is vibrating.
The paintings are striking in their strength, depth of color, contrast in light and shadow, and stylistic distortions that make them more expressive and memorable than if they were photo-realistic. As a group, they are a vivid and indelible account, bringing the players of the Negro League alive. An added delight is the display of rough thumbnail sketches.
This summer, the paintings will be on display at the Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum in Pittsburgh. Three, including the portrait of Josh Gibson, have been purchased by the Muskegon Museum of Art in Michigan.
The artist is quoted in an exhibition brochure:
Read More“What I found most striking was the story of the Negro League; its overwhelming success despite the daunting odds against it. The spirit of independence, having made something out of nothing at all. Armed with only intellectual and athletic talents, and the sheer will to play the game that they loved so dearly, this group of men assumed control of their destiny. After being pushed out of the game by an overwhelming majority, African-Americans, rather than giving up, formed leagues of their own, successful leagues that lasted almost thirty years.
“Overall, I hope that I have done justice to these somewhat forgotten men and given them the tribute that they deserve. I don’t wish to deify them but rather honor them, portray them as the heroes they were and further solidify their place in history.“
They Didn’t Get That From Me!
1. Socialized Roles
This is why talking about race is so crucial for children’s development. If we don’t engage kids in conversations that give them permission and language to say what’s on their minds, to voice the associations they’re making and the conclusions they’re reaching, all of this conditioning goes unchallenged. When we provide a safe place for children to speak, we get the opportunity to engage with them and offer them the skills to break the silence, to interrogate the Soup, and to challenge socialized roles.
Read More