Last night at 10:30 pm. CST, my “show” was on. I conveniently had more important things to do, namely, support my friend hw, whose concert happened to be the same night. At 10:30 pm CST, I was at the lovely and charming Moscow on the Hill with a large group of friends for the after-show party. I remember looking at my watch almost exactly at 10:30 and thinking how relieved I
was to be there instead.
I’ve now had a chance to view the Searching Seoul update. Well, it wasn’t quite as painful as I’d expected it to be. Because it is only a half hour show, they had to cut out a lot of the original piece. Which means you only see me crying half of the time I did in the original.
The “update” part was actually all right. There was still too much hyperbole for my liking – for example, in the introduction to the “update,” Jason Davis (the reporter) says we came home “bitterly disappointed.” Not just disappointed, but somehow he decided I was bitterly disappointed. He also said that we were “two baby orphans” when I was in fact, almost 3 years old when I came. Also, he perpetuates the idea that all adopted Koreans are the result of unmarried women. While that may be the case in the past 15-20 years, it is not the reason the majority of those of us in our 30s-50s were sent out for adoption (but that’s another post for another time).
Oh, and he called a plate of galbi, bulgogi.
At any rate, I felt I came across as much more put together and not such a sap. Plus, I like my hairstyle much better now. It was so short back then!
KSTP is supposed to be sending me DVD copies of both the original show and the updated version. I will let you know when I get copies made. But until then, here is a chance to see it online. Warning: it’s very slow and the resolution is pretty bad (at least it is on my computer).
For those of you with internet explorer, you can view each segment online. This will only work with IE or Netscape. Click on the links below for each segment, and then once on the page, click on the VIDEO link. I would be happy to hear your feedback.
For segment 1: “Return to Korea”
For segment 2: “Going on national television”
For segment 3: “Returning Home”
Harlow's Monkey 