Temporary TCKid Home

I am a quirky soul in your eyes
You don’t know how to classify me
Your classifications are right
Your classifications are wrong

You say that I’m an American
I do act and think like an American sometimes
Many of my friends are Americans
Americans with an Asian skin tones
But you don’t know that I don’t care about
American TV shows and dramas at all
You don’t know that even non-Americans know better
than me about certain American culture
The mainstream American culture with Lady Gaga on it
You don’t know my sourness toward mono Americans
You don’t know that I’m not and never will be
patriotic for the U.S.
You don’t know how I feel out of this place

You say that my looks, documents, and birthplace justify that I’m Korean
I do feel Korean and love Korea, but I feel like a foreigner too
My Korean tongue will scream out that my Korean got rusty
I know a lot about Korean history and culture too
I am one who laughs hard at Korean TV shows
I only have 3 years of clear memories about Korea
I don’t know what to expect if I go there
Excitement? Joy? Nostalgia? Fear?
Korea is home and motherland
Korea is the country of myth

You say that I have an accent
What do you mean by an accent?
Korean? American? hybrid?

You say that I sound like a Korean-American
Wrong! I came to the U.S. when I was 14

You say that I have a strong accent
Wrong! It’s not strong as Koreans living in Korea
I’ve been speaking your language since I was 8

Even I don’t know what exactly is my accent is
So don’t dare to judge me by an accent

You deny the expat kid part of me in my life
You forget that I learned English in an International School
You forget that I made friends from different nationalities there
You will never understand that it’s a root of my identity

I’m just a person from different countries and cultures
I am ME!