As a Korean-American adoptee raised by a single Jewish woman in Manhattan, I can’t speak Korean. It’s a stretch to say I have three Korean friends. My reasonable fear is that I’m a “banana” (a derogatory term for Asians who look Asian on the outside but are white inside).

There is evidence I’m on Team Banana; see me, the middle-aged mother planning a Korean New Year’s party– grilling my weary friend Jin Sun on what Koreans eat, play and otherwise do on said occasion. See me in the strange position of reminding my five year old daughter that we are Korean only to be told “but I want to be Chinese.”

Then occasionally something happens that shakes my certainty that I am in fact, even Asian at all. Take the time I was seated in my progressive legal services office minding my business, only to be accosted by a Chinese coworker bearing a box of primly wrapped rice cakes. She peered into my office to offer a treat to me for the New Year. Before I had a chance to respond, she stopped a few steps from my chair and asked “are you Asian?”

This caused me to laugh so riotously and unceremoniously, I had to press my stomach with one hand so as not to tip out of my chair. In my politically correct office, was she worried I, of the round-faced, narrow-eyed and black-haired variety, would not identify as Asian and would take offense? At the time the incident made a good story about my unique workplace. But deep down, I was unsettled. Had I lost my Asian-ness? Was it something that needed to be nurtured and could fade at any moment if it was not?

So what gives me, at age 47, the audacity to start a blog celebrating all things Korean- drama, music, food, stationary, clothing and beauty trends? Consider my exuberant, galloping love of Korean pop culture and my sometimes weird, outsider perspective. As a witch of a classmate from my snotty high school once said, “Elissa is an enigma.” Enigmas, Liz, DOMINATE.

Aside from the K-pop and K-dramas, which we devour as a family, there’s so much to admire in terms of Korean artists, writers and directors, and I want to unroot it all. For fun and quite possibly ego’s sake, I’ll post my art, drawings and homemade dolls/figurines mostly of Koreans (as shown in below photos). As a family, we’ll try making Korean street food and food from our favorite K-dramas, watching Korean films we’re not familiar with, interviewing Koreans we admire and hope this culminates in a triumphant trip to Korea once COVID has faded.

What else can this site offer? My 11.5 year old son who is trans, autistic and loves to write wants to unpack Korean identity and other topics. No doubt his posts will lend some weight/seriousness to this blog to counter my disjointed levity. I’m hoping my cousin Leah will share her Korean recipes on this site. We eventually aim to sell wonderful things made by Koreans. I hope you’ll bear with me if I digress; I have an overflowing barrel of ADHD interests (e.g., treehouses/mini homes, creative writing, collecting journals, drawing, making stuff, art history, war movies, politics, making creative parties and starting activity clubs). Finally, this blog is a tribute to my therapist who always encourages me to develop my creative side because that’s where I am most at peace.

Maybe by loving Korea, rolling around, and blindly snorting my way through the culture, I can reach this mantel of Korean-hood and at the same time amuse and inform others. No more Banana!