When Kim Eun-hyung arrived in South Korea from China in 2008, at age 14, he didn’t speak a word of Korean. Prior to his arrival, he had been living alone with his maternal grandfather in China’s Fushun, Liaoning province, as his mother had moved to Korea by herself upon her marriage to a South Korean national.

“My biological father died about five months after I was born,” the 22-year-old said in an interview with The Korea Herald. “My mother and I moved a lot while living in China. As a result I couldn’t make a lot of friends. There’s not much to miss about China.”

Yet his new life in Korea as a teenager wasn’t so easy, either. His Korean stepfather rarely spoke to him at home, treating him as if “he didn’t exist.” At school, it was difficult for him to follow classes that were entirely in Korean. He was often bullied by his classmates, who used anti-Chinese slurs against him. “For the first few months, I just slept through all of my classes,” Kim said.
Kim, who now works as a bilingual retail worker at a department store in central Seoul, is one of many foreign-born immigrants born to non-South Koreans overseas who moved to Korea as children. From 2012-2014 alone, some 40,000 such children, including young North Korean defectors, arrived in Korea with their parents.

A recent government study showed that a significant number of them are struggling here, especially with job searching, education and family problems. As of last year, more than 30 percent of such children aged 15-24 are not in school and out of work, while 58.3 percent experienced their biological parents’ divorce in their countries of origin before moving to Korea.

Many of the children migrate to Korea after their mothers remarry. As of last year, more than 85 percent of all marriage migrants in Korea were women. The struggles are similar for young North Korean defectors, who not only face difficulties adjusting, but also social and political prejudices.

Identity politics

Even with her university degree in Chinese language, finding a job in Seoul was a challenge for Lee Min-jin, who arrived in Korea as a teenage North Korean defector. The 25-year-old lived in China with her mother from 1997 until her arrival in South Korea in 2009. Throughout their years in China as illegal residents, her mother had two live-in relationships with Chinese men. Both times, Lee considered them to be stepfathers. Her biological father, whom Lee and her mother briefly lived with in China, was repatriated to North Korea and died there in 2004.

In spite of financial difficulties and her illegal status, Lee managed to master the Chinese language while living in China, which eventually enabled her to enroll in a prestigious university in Seoul known for its foreign language education.

Still, Lee struggled to find part-time or full-time jobs during and after her university years, mainly because of her North Korean accent, she said. “Once, I called to inquire about this part-time job position,” she said. “As soon as I talked, the person who picked up the phone cut me off and just said, ‘we don’t hire foreigners.’ She hung up even before I could finish my sentence.”

During her years in South Korea, she constantly struggled with her sense of identity. “In China, I think I was accepted as a Chinese person,” she said.

“I spoke Chinese fluently and didn’t have a foreign accent. People assumed that I was one of the locals. But in South Korea, I’d constantly be asked where I was from, because I speak Korean with an accent and I don’t know how to get rid of it. And many times it didn’t feel safe to say I was from North Korea, as I knew it would only bring disadvantages in my life.”

Lee, who now works as a Chinese interpreter at a cosmetic surgery clinic in Seoul, thought about moving back to China after being rejected a number of times by different clinics. 

Lee said she is still careful when people ask her country of origin. “Unless I’m in a situation where I have to tell that I’m from North Korea, such as job interviews, I decide first whether or not I can trust this person,” she said. “To those whom I trust, I tell them honestly that I’m a North Korean defector. To those I don’t trust, I tell them I’ve lived in China for a long time.”

As of last year, there are nearly 30,000 North Korean defectors living in the South and their average income is only two-thirds the national average. Seven out of 10 defectors are women and 58.4 percent of young defectors said in a 2014 survey that they do not wish to identify where they are from.

Intergenerational cultural dissonance

Sabahat Moon Javaid was 8 years old when he moved to South Korea with his family from Pakistan. His father brought his family here as he wanted to study Christian theology at a Korean institution. The 24-year-old recently applied for South Korean citizenship and plans to live here, though his father wishes to return to Pakistan.

“I have all of my memories in Korea,” he said. “Although I was born in Pakistan, I wouldn’t know what I would do once I return.”

Javaid said while he and his older sister enjoyed South Korean culture while growing up, his father would often get upset about them not keeping their Pakistani traditions and customs.

“For example, my father would be upset about the length of my sister’s skirt, saying it’s inappropriately short. But really, most (Korean) people wouldn’t consider that skirt to be short,” he said. “There were many instances like that. And I’d tell him, if you are this unhappy about us following Korean ways of living, then why are we here? Why did you bring us here in the first place?”

Shin Kuk-kyun, the chief of advocacy team of the Migrant Youth Foundation of Korea, said foreign-born immigrant children face unique challenges that are different from “multicultural children,” who are Korean-born children born to a Korean national and his or her foreign-born spouse.

“There is so much loss involved in moving from one country to the next,” he said. “And this can be traumatic for both children and their parents. At the same time, the process of assimilation can be stressful for children as well as their parents. And most immigrant children move to another country because they have no option but to follow their parents’ decisions.”

Increasing demand for support

Overseas studies have shown that the immigrant experience can have a profound impact on the social and emotional development of children, especially those separated from their families or facing an uncertain future.

According to a 2013 report by the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, adjusting to a new home, language and culture can be difficult, and these changes can make children immigrants face difficulties talking about their feelings, misbehave, do poorly in school or have trouble fitting in and making friends.

According to Shin from the MYF, the number of immigrant children who have requested mental health support from his institution has been increasing over the last few years. In 2015 alone, the MYF financed psychiatric and counselling treatments for 750 schoolchildren, with the support of Hyundai Motors.

One of the students was a child of North Korean defectors. He had a turbulent relationship with his abusive father and was doing poorly in school. Another was living with his Chinese-born mother and his alcoholic Korean stepfather. 

“I think having a stepparent who doesn’t speak your language can be stressful for many kids, especially if the parent does not make a lot of efforts to create a welcoming environment for the child, or learn about the child’s native language or culture,” said Kim Joong-hoon, another official at the MYF. “Also, when a parent is stressed as he or she struggles to adjust in a new country, the stress can affect their children. I think immigrant parents should be given educational classes on the unique challenges their children may face as young migrants.”

Citizenship issue 

Lack of access to social resources while waiting for South Korean citizenship can also be difficult for many immigrant children. According to the Justice Ministry, it takes at least two years for children born to non-Korean citizens overseas to obtain their citizenship after arriving in the country. In order to do so, the child needs to be legally adopted by his or her Korean stepparent.

For a child who does not have a South Korean stepparent, obtaining South Korean citizenship is not impossible, but it could take years.

Kim Eun-hyung, who became a naturalized South Korean citizen about six months ago, said he was once rejected from a state-run job training program for multicultural teenagers because he was still waiting for his citizenship to be granted. 

“Such programs should be given to all foreign-born immigrant children regardless of their citizenship status,” he said. “Two years is a long time for a teenager. They can’t just wait until they get the citizenship while missing out on all the opportunities.”

When asked about how the government can do better to support young North Korean defectors, Lee Min-jin said there should be free voice coaching classes for them so they can get rid of their North Korean accent. “I still get questions and (negative) comments about my accent,” she said.

But another young North Korean defector, Jeong Eun-seon, said what should be changed is public perception, not their accent. “What we need is a society where people don’t get discriminated against because of certain accents, not voice coaching classes,” she said. “There are many regional accents in Korean. The North Korean accent should be considered just like any other regional accent here, such as the ones of Chungcheong or Gyeongsang provinces.”

By Claire Lee (dyc@heraldcorp.com)

Names of the interviewed migrants have been changed upon request --Ed.