He does say ya'll occasionally, Umpa!
Fortunately, Austinites don't have too much of a "twang". So many of the people here are transplants from other states and countries. We're originally from Oregon!
The hanboks are beautiful, aren't they?? They were gifts from his foster families when we went back to visit them (for the first time since his adoption in 2003) last year. The one Nate is wearing was given to him by his foster mother who cared for him in the city of his birth for his first couple months of life. She's been fostering babies for twenty years and Nate was the first "baby" to come back and meet her. She was SO sweet and just loved on us the entire day! After the babies are stable health-wise and a foster family in Seoul has been found, they are transferred to the new family until their adoption. Since he was with this family when we brought him home, we met them when we went to get him. He was their first foster child and the foster father sat with tears streaming down his cheeks for the hour long first meeting with them! They had gotten SO attached to him and we wanted to be sure to keep a connection for Nate in Korea, so we slipped them our email address (something that the adoption agency didn't encourage). We'd kept in touch with them over the years, sending pictures and writing letters and sending and receiving packages from them. We consider them our Korean family.
When we went back to visit last year, they set us up at a hotel near their home and we spent several days with them, reconnecting and doing a lot of sign language and pointing, since neither of us knows each other's languages well! They insisted on having my husband and I fitted and had beautiful hanboks made for us. They also told us that they'd love for Nate and Eli (our older son) to come and stay with them for a month during the summer when they're a little older. To that end, we've been encouraging Nate to learn Korean with a few other adoptees and Korean American children in our area. We also do try to share some of the culturally important holidays and customs with him so that he's comfortable with them. We've heard from so many adult adoptees that didn't have any exposure to culture from their birth countries and felt really disconnected and not quite "whole". We want Nate to embrace his Korean-ness just as much as his American-ness and feel proud to be both. My best friend was adopted from Korea, also, and went back for the first time when traveled there last year. She has no connection to her foster family or birth family and the trip was a bit bittersweet for her. We hope that by keeping a connection with Nate's foster family, if he does decide to go back and visit or live there he'll have someone there who loves him and welcomes him.
