KAMP 2010

Last August our family made our first trip to Cedar Falls, Iowa, to attend the final days of Korea culture camp a.k.a. KAMP, an acronym for Korean Adoption Means Pride. This year, with Thomas being kindergarten age and able to participate more fully in the numerous daily cultural activities, we journeyed a day earlier. It is always an honor to be in the presence of others whose families have also come into existence and grown through adoption. And it always gives me a deep joy and gratitude to see my boys surrounded by so, so many other children and young adults who share their ethnicity and heritage. As I sat in that little place we called home for four days, observing the room in which the boys slept, a room complete with two sets of bunk beds, one being three-tiered, I could not help but be reminded of Bertha Holt who after viewing a movie about Korean orphans produced by World Vision in the 1950s, experienced that still small voice in her heart. "More and more I found myself wishing we could bring some of the Korean orphans into our own home where we could love and care for them. I would walk from room to room thinking of how we could put a cot here...and another bed there. It even occurred to me that some of the rooms could be partitioned and made into two rooms without depriving anyone," Bertha wrote. Ultimately, Harry and Bertha Holt responded to that divine nudge with a resounding "yes," and at the age of fifty years, the Holts added eight additional Korean children to their family of eight. Thank you Harry and Bertha for your faithfulness. Thank you to all our KAMP friends for another blessed year. Truly we look forward to many, many years to come!

Elliot packing his hanbok.

The boys insisted on wearing their hanboks around the house before actually putting them into their suticases. "Where's my hanbok?" Russell kept inquiring. And just a note: These hanboks were gifts from the boys' foster mother, Ms. Yang. 

Thomas and his class.

Thomas and Thomas.

Demonstrating some Taekwondo moves.

Thomas and new friends Nathan and Seth.

And of course our little Ethiopian princess was fawned over.

Yes, since the boys own traditional Ethiopian clothing, I hoped to purchase a hanbok for little Lu but none this year so she is wearing the dress given to us in ET at Holt's farewell ceremony.

The cultural parade.

Thomas' class performing a traditional fan dance.

Thomas with his counselors Molly and Brandon.

Our friend Mary. Russell keeps asking still, "Where's my Mary?" Fortunately, she is only in Solon.

The three-year-olds.

Elliot and his friend Matthew.

Freedom

Freedom

Rabindranath Tagore

Freedom from fear is the freedom

I claim for you my motherland!

Freedom from the burden of the ages, bending your head,

breaking your back, blinding your eyes to the beckoning

call of the future;

Freedom from the shackles of slumber wherewith

you fasten yourself in night's stillness,

mistrusting the star that speaks of truth's adventurous paths;

freedom from the anarchy of destiny

whole sails are weakly yielded to the blind uncertain winds,

and the helm to a hand ever rigid and cold as death.

Freedom from the insult of dwelling in a puppet's world,

where movements are started through brainless wires,

repeated through mindless habits,

where figures wait with patience and obedience for the 

master of show,

to be stirred into a mimicry of life.

Poetry Wednesday

Bonnie and Clyde

We See the Moon

Korean Folk Art

To you, the veiled ones, the ones shrouded in mystery, the ones whom I believe somehow mystically walk amongst us, aiding and comforting us in our journey. Your physical absence is felt most profoundly on this day, the day of our son's birth. 

Happy 6th Birthday Thomas Jung-hyun

May God Grant You Many Years!

We See the Moon

Carrie A. Kitze

I was born in a faraway land, 

of parents with faces in the shadows.

Where are you now?

I may never know you but I wonder

who you are and what you look like.

Do you wonder too?

The full moon glows heavy in the night sky.

A beacon of beauty and truth.

Why did you leave me?

Its soft light filters through rustling leaves,

making shadows that play on the grass.

Do you remember me?

I think of you when the moon is round and golden.

During a quiet time, a peaceful time.

Do you think of me?

I know you are always with me. All I need is to look

at the moon in the night sky and think of you.

Are you looking now?

Poetry Wednesday